Leo Donofrio: SCOTUS has No Original Jurisdiction to Issue a Writ of Quo Warranto
Here’s Leo Donofrio’s latest posting:
Before I address the legal facts of this headline, I want to address all of the other Presidential eligibility cases that went before SCOTUS including my own. It’s true that – technically - Donofrio v. Wells could still be pending if I chose to submit a full petition for writ of certiorari. Many have written to me and asked why I haven’t resorted to that tactic. The answer is fairly simple: my case is moot.
The same is true for Wrotnowski v. Bysiewicz, Lightfoot v. Bowen and the Berg cases, all of which asked for emergency stays or emergency injunctions to stop a candidate from becoming “president-elect” and later president.
Once my case stay application was denied, I had exhausted the only emergency procedure available to me and the US Supreme Court Rules would not have facilitated the resolution of a full petition before the candidate was sworn in as President (or become president-elect).
When Obama was sworn in by Chief Justice Roberts as President, our Constitutional separation of powers kicked in big time. Because of the separation of powers enumerated in our Constitution, the United States Supreme Court has no ability to remove a sitting President. Nowhere in the Document does it give the Supreme Court (or the judicial branch) any authority to remove a sitting President.
All of the eligibility law suits – brought before electoral college votes were counted in Congress – sought to challenge the qualifications of candidate Obama to be President. Once he graduated from “candidate Obama” to “President-elect Obama” and later “President Obama”, every single eligibility law suit pending before SCOTUS became moot.
Those actions are moot because SCOTUS has no authority to act on the relief requested in those law suits. And SCOTUS knows this better than anybody else.
Full petitions or motions to reconsider filed in any of the eligibility suits that went to SCOTUS before Obama became President (including my own) now leave SCOTUS with only one possible course of action thereto: a Supreme dog and pony show. And I don’t think Chief Justice Roberts will be calling in the Westminster Kennel Club anytime soon. Those cases are dead done and dusted. Call the embalming squad.
POINT I: SCOTUS HAS NO ORIGINAL JURISDICTION TO ISSUE WRITS OF QUO WARRANTO.
Article 3 Section 2 of the US Constitution grants SCOTUS its authority as follows:
all Cases affecting Ambassadors, other public Ministers and Consuls, and those in which a State shall be Party, the supreme Court shall have original Jurisdiction. In all the other Cases before mentioned, the supreme Court shall have appellate Jurisdiction, both as to Law and Fact, with such Exceptions, and under such Regulations as the Congress shall make.”
There you have it. SCOTUS only has original jurisdiction over cases affecting Ambassadors, other public Ministers, Consuls and where a State is a party to the law suit. If the action is not in aid of their appellate jurisdiction, then that law suit cannot originate with the United States Supreme Court. A quo warranto to determine POTUS eligibility brought directly to SCOTUS does not fall within their Constitutional authority. [Thanks to reader "Lawyer" for her insights on this issue.]
SCOTUS can probably review a quo warranto case under the All Writs Act. But such review is only available if it comes within their appellate jurisdiction. Original jurisdiction cannot be invoked for writs of quo warranto and any attempt to institute a proceeding in quo warranto directly with SCOTUS should fail. It would be a violation of the Constitution.
US Code Section 1651, aka “the all writs act”:
(a) The Supreme Court and all courts established by Act of Congress may issue all writs necessary or appropriate in aid of their respective jurisdictions and agreeable to the usages and principles of law.
In the landmark SCOTUS case, Marbury v. Madison, the Supreme Courtdealt with this exact issue, whether SCOTUS had original jurisdiction to entertain one of the extraordinary writs. In that case, it was a writ of mandamus. And SCOTUS held they did not have any authority to act under original jurisdiction to issue the writ:The constitution vests the whole judicial power of the United States in one supreme court, and such inferior courts as congress shall, from time to time, ordain and establish. This power is expressly extended to all cases arising under the laws of the United States; and consequently, in some form, may be exercised over the present case; because the right claimed is given by a law of the United States.
In the distribution of this power it is declared that ‘the supreme court shall have original jurisdiction in all cases affecting ambassadors, other public ministers and consuls, and those in which a state shall be a party. In all other cases, the supreme court shall have appellate jurisdiction.’…
…If congress remains at liberty to give this court appellate jurisdiction, where the constitution has declared their jurisdiction shall be original; and original jurisdiction where the constitution has declared it shall be appellate; the distribution of jurisdiction made in the constitution, is form without substance. (Emphasis added.)
SCOTUS cannot entertain any quo warranto brought directly to it. They must wait for it to come on appeal. Please take note of the statement above concerning the Constitution’s grant of Congressional authority to ordain and establish inferior courts. It is this Congressional power coupled with the exclusive power given to Congress to remove a sitting President which was exercised by Congress within the very text of the District of Columbia Code’s quo warranto statute.
In that statute, Congress exclusively authorized the District Court of the District of Columbia with the power to hear cases challenging the eligibility of a sitting officer holding a United States national office located in the District of Columbia.
SCOTUS is constitutionally estopped from issuing a writ of quo warranto regarding Obama’s qualifications to be President if the action is brought directly to them. Any attempt to do that should certainly be denied. This is simply a legal fact. Any attorney who brings such an action to SCOTUS directly will be doing terrible damage to the cause on account of the public relations disaster awaiting certain denial by SCOTUS.
POINT II: UNITED STATES LAW INCLUDES A PRESUMPTION THAT THE NATURAL BORN CITIZEN CLAUSE HAS A UNIQUE EFFECT OTHER THAN THAT OF A 14TH AMENDMENT CITIZEN.
Chief Justice Marshall (pictured above) delivered the opinion of the Court in Marbury v. Madison. His “form without substance” quote truly made me wonder what he would say about the natural born citizen clause.
As I thought about it, Chief Justice Marshall’s voice came to me right from the pages of that opinion and I realized suddenly that he didaddress the issue when he said:
“It cannot be presumed that any clause in the constitution is intended to be without effect; and therefore such construction is inadmissible, unless the words require it.”
This must kill the argument that being “a 14th Amendment citizen” has the same effect on Presidential eligibility as being a “natural born citizen”. If being a “citizen” had the same exact effect as being a “natural born citzen” then the clause would have no effect. As stated by Chief Justice Marshall, “such a construction is inadmissible.”
Holy cow. I just had one. It’s more like the proverbial elephant in the room.
We know that the 14th Amendment only mentions the word “citizen”. It does not use the words “natural born citizen”. And it makes no distinction between a “citizen” born in the US and a “citizen” naturalized in the US. Under the 14th Amendment, they are equals. The 14th Amendment certainly does not state that being a “citizen” satisfies the qualification of Article 2 Section 1 Clause 5.
Those who are trying to read such an interpretation into the 14th Amendment do so at the ignorance of Chief Justice Marshall’s landmark opinion in Marbury v. Madison. Those cunning arguments would leave the “natural born citizen” clause without effect. Such a construction isinadmissible.
Chief Justice Marshall provided only one exception to this rule, “such construction is inadmissible, unless the words require it”. The words “natural born citizen” don’t require the clause to be construed to mean the same thing as the word “citizen”. The exact opposite is true. The plain text of the Constitution shows that the framers allowed persons to become Senators and Representatives if they were “Citizens”, but as to the office of President they required a “natural born citizen”. So the exception is irrelevant here.
Marbury v. Madison creates a standing presumption against anyinterpretation that would render the “natural born citizen” clause to have no effect independent of being a “citizen”. Chief Justice Marshall insisted such a construction is inadmissible.
INADMISSIBLE.
Inadmissible in this context means such an argument is not competent to be considered. It’s essentially no different from the situation where a piece of evidence is excluded from trial. It means you can’t even argue such a thing before the court. Please think about this carefully. This means any argument that a “14th Amendment citizen” is the same as a “natural born citizen” – for purposes of effecting POTUS eligibility -is not competent to be considered by the court.
If the natural born citizen issue were ever heard on the merits, the court hearing the case must recognize that a presumption exists requiring the natural born citizen clause to have independent effectfrom all clauses which just refer to “citizen”.
Effect is the key.
What is the independent effect attributed to the “natural born citizen” clause? The effect is that just being a “citizen” isn’t enough to satisfy the requirement of Article 2 Section 1 Clause 5 which demands that the President of the United States be a “natural born citizen”.
This means that under current United States law, the “natural born citizen” clause is presumed to mean something other than a “14th Amendment citizen”. And no other construction is even admissible.
You can take all the law review articles, emotional pleas claiming the natural born citizen clause is obsolete, the 14th Amendment arguments, Wong Kim Ark, and every main stream media barker, throw them before the SCOTUS altar, and make them kneel to Chief Justice Marshall and the framers.
SCOTUS has spoken on this issue, and it said the “natural born citizen” clause, being a clause directly written into the text of the Constitution, is presumed to have a unique and independent effect.
This is a point I have failed to make up until right now, so please forgive me for having not locked it down earlier. But don’t spank me too hard since it appears to be an original argument. It’s not a point I’ve seen published anywhere else.
Of course it’s well known that each Constitutional clause must have an independent effect. But I don’t believe any other commentary has been published exposing this legal presumption in favor of the “natural born citizen” clause which also renders other arguments inadmissible. By other arguments, I refer to all theories claiming that a 14th Amendment “citizen” born on US soil satisfies the Constitutional qualifications for President.
Regardless, I must give credit to my sister (an ex prosecutor) for having brought the independent legal effect argument to my attention while Donofrio v. Wells was still pending with SCOTUS. But without having Chief Justice Marshall’s brilliant opinion from Marbury v. Madisonin front of me, I didn’t grasp the spectacular power of the presumption. So I’ll leave you with those words once more. Please give them your utmost concentration:
“It cannot be presumed that any clause in the constitution is intended to be without effect; and therefore such construction is inadmissible…”
Leo C. Donofrio 03.16.2009
-Phil
Leo Donofrio is an American hero who has been disposed of by people in power who have sworn to uphold the law; but have not. BHO is not a legal President and therefore we the people of the United States have been “Murphy’d”. I understand the separation of Powers and that the SCOTUS has no apparatus to correct this wrong… (and I certainly do not wish that they ever be given such power), but somebody should admit the wrong, the lies and deceitful tactics. If we, the people, are shown the Truth, we will see to it that the situation be righted – by revolution, by impeachment (if a lie or cover-up can be exposed), by amendment, or by resignation as a result of extreme condemnation and civil disobedience (least likely after watching BHO for the past 11 months).
We have a national nonprofit political party, the DNC, who collected millions of dollars across state lines, by putting forth a fraudulent candidate who has repetitively refused to qualify himself and done the opposite, blocked all information about his past. I hope someone takes the DNC to court for on the RICO Act, for white collar fraud and mass corruption of a federal election. The DNC failed to uphold their own bylaws to elect at their convention a constitutionally qualified candidate. Both they and their candidate, when both have been approached, refuse to provide any documents proving qualifications. Forget Obama for a moment…the DNC should be held accountable for massive fraud, theft on a grand scale through deliberate fraudulent campaigning, corruption of the ballot in 50 states. These 50 states had arrangements with the party, due to years of trust, that a mere signature was sufficient. They took advantage of this trust and betrayed the American public. The DNC should be banned from campaigning in any state in the future, and the officers of that party and Pelosi who signed off on Obama at the DNC convention should be held accountable for treacherous behavior in an effort to undermine the Constitution. The RICO Act, as used in the Kentucky voting fraud on a large scale, is applicable to the current DNC Mafia-style corruption and theft of the American ballot, leading to the placement of a usurper with a criminal behavior background (perjury on his Illinois bar application, payback with grants and wife getting raises on hospital board) in the highest office, a man who seems to not even be a citizen of the United States. Good grief.
Garacka,
This is a tricky thing.
According to Article 5 of the Constitution, there are only two ways to amend:
However, either way, we are talking about a Legislative process. In theory, let’s say that an amendment is proposed and fully passes the amending process that abrogates rights as specified within the 9th and/or 10th Amendments (to be current). Since the People and/or the States have spoken, that would seem to end it. However, what happens when that amendment is clearly seen by critics as deprecating another Amendment in the Constitution? Then you have to involve the Judiciary to settle the matter.
In reality, one would hope that since the amending process is so onerous and would require a practical super-majority to pass, critics of such an amendment would be able to have their voice heard in the process. Nevertheless, it is theoretically possible for the amending process to produce an unconstitutional amendment!
-Phil
I have read Donofrio and he has a wonderful understanding. He explalins it all very well. I understand and agree with him. Most of the posting above must be from Obots. The criticism of Leo is wrong.
Anyway it does not matter as the supreme court will show that Leo is correct.
Cymraeg March 17, 2009 at 6:19 pm
“Something to consider on the Natural-born issue: Based on Common Law the relationship between “citizen” and “Natural-born Citizen” is a follows:
1. The Class “Citizen” refers to all citizens.
2. There are two subclasses of “Citizen”: “Natural-born” and “Naturalized”. If you sre s citizen you are either natural-born or naturalized.”
Perhaps based on Common-Law, but I understand the Constitutional way to describe it is to say the 2 classes are Native-born and Naturalized. Of the Native-borns, there are those born on the soil with 1 or both parents non-citizens and those born on soil with both parents citizens. The latter being the natural-borns.
Someone commented that Donofrio was using tortured logic, but I saw the logic as being clear. Being novel should not be cause for rejection. Also, whether a Court will accept it is another story.
Regarding unconstitutional amendments, it seems (to me a non-lawyer) that, if that can’t be done, then the Courts role in interpreting it could have the same effect. In other words, they may have to interpret an ambiguity or contradication as to which one overides. This would in effect be the same as if they could say an amendment was unconstitutional.
That make sense?
>>>no he isn’t, go back and read it again.
Let’s all read it again:
As I thought about it, Chief Justice Marshall’s voice came to me right from the pages of that opinion and I realized suddenly that he did address the issue when he said:
“It cannot be presumed that any clause in the constitution is intended to be without effect; and therefore such construction is inadmissible, unless the words require it.”
This must kill the argument that being “a 14th Amendment citizen” has the same effect on Presidential eligibility as being a “natural born citizen”. If being a “citizen” had the same exact effect as being a “natural born citzen” then the clause would have no effect. As stated by Chief Justice Marshall, “such a construction is inadmissible.”
While you are correct that the Judiciary has no inherent “energy” to bring cases unto itself, the fact that nobody has brought any number of potentially unconstitutional issues before the Court doesn’t necessarily make said issues constitutional.
With respect to amendments, JeffM’s original comment implied that it is possible for an amendment to be declared unconstitution, which is, by definition, impossible.
And JeffM’s original comment also implied that someone had brought such a such case.
Leo: Excellent Research
Your statement: “If the natural born citizen issue were ever heard on the merits, the court hearing the case must recognize that a presumption exists requiring the natural born citizen clause to have independent effectfrom all clauses which just refer to “citizen”.”
To further enforce the claim of clause effect, consider the two clauses of eligibility: Thus, 1) “No Person except a Natural Born Citizen, or 2) a Citizen of the United States, at the time of the Adoption of this Constitution,….”
The distinction between the two clauses speaks for itself.
Vincent Omnia Veritas,
While you are correct that the Judiciary has no inherent “energy” to bring cases unto itself, the fact that nobody has brought any number of potentially unconstitutional issues before the Court doesn’t necessarily make said issues constitutional.
The overall issue is making the law expanded to the point that it covers dealing with exactly what eligibility is and, subsequently, providing one route to enforceability. Since there are so many theories floating around of exactly what a “natural born citizen” is, it seems to me that it would be good to get such codified before going any further. And that’s going to take more than simply a comment on an Internet site.
-Phil
Practical Kat,
Excellent post. I really haven’t paid much attention to the whole quo warranto thing as doesn’t his whole argument rest on a tortured interpretation of Article II, clause 6 that Congress has the power to remove the president other than for impeachment.
“In Case of the Removal of the President from Office, or of his Death, Resignation, or Inability to discharge the Powers and Duties of the said Office, the Same shall devolve on the Vice President, and the Congress may by Law provide for the Case of Removal, Death, Resignation or Inability, both of the President and Vice President, declaring what Officer shall then act as President, and such Officer shall act accordingly, until the Disability be removed, or a President shall be elected.”
Aren’t there a bunch of reasons why Donofrio’s interpretion isn’t plausible:
(i) It isn’t the best drafted clause, but the most natural reading (and the universal historical understanding) of the provision is that the first part provides for automatic succession for a vacancy in just the presidency and the second part authorizes congress to provide a law for succession for a vacancy in both the presidency and vice presidency (as in both are killed at once). This reading makes perfect sense and clauses should be given their most natural reading.
(ii) If Donofrio’s reading was plausible, Death and Resignation would not be grouped with Removal in the second part since, with respect to Death and Resignation, it only makes sense to say Congress can provide for law of succession, not death or resignation itself. It’s absurd to read the phrase as authorizing removal itself rather than law of succession in the case of removal when removal is in a string of events that can only only read to provide for a law of succession in the case such events happen. I wouldn’t try this type of interpretation of a law school exam.
(iii) The rest of the clause other than the few words referanced by Donofrio clearly deals with succession so it makes no sense contextually that a substantive power of removal would be in middle of this clause.
(iv) The second part of the clause by its terms only relates to removal of both the president and the vice-president at once as it says “and” not “or” and a reading that it can apply to just the president doesn’t make sense as succession in the case of death or resignation is already provided by the first part of the clause and, with respect to death or resignation, the second part can only deal with succession. Why would congress be provided power to remove only both but not one?
(v) Donofrio’s reading presumably gives congress the power to remove the president for any reason as, in his reading, the text has no limitation. Why would the founders then include an impleachment clause that would be superfluous? What would remain of separation of powers with this reading? It is unlikely the founders would have been so sloppy as to have text provide for unlimed power of removal and leave it to others to infer some kind of limitation.
(vi) I doubt there is any historical support for this. I thought orignalists laughed at claims that one has discovered a new meaning of the constitution after 220 years that no one ever thought of before.
Seriously, I am missing something or is this a completely implausible reading.
Bob said
That is untrue regarding amendments being Constitutional. Look no further than Amendment XVIII, which was repealed by Amendment XXI before the Supreme Court could deem it Unconstitutional based on violation of the Commerce Clause found in Article I of the U.S. Constitution.
Some have also questioned Amendment XVI
The 18th amendment was specifically repealed by the 21st. It was not ruled invalid by the Supreme Court. The Court has no power to “undo” an amendment.
Donofrio’s argument that the main body of the Constitution can trump something in an amendment is weak. If anything, amendments have the power to trump the original text. For example, amendments have changed the way we elect presidents and senators over the years. By using Donofrio’s argument to the extreme one could try to say that women should not vote and slavery would still be allowed. The 14th amendment clarified the meaning of citizenship and stands by itself.
Look no further than Amendment XVIII, which was repealed by Amendment XXI before the Supreme Court could deem it Unconstitutional based on violation of the Commerce Clause found in Article I of the U.S. Constitution.
No court ever held the 18th Amendment was unconstitutional, and its subsequent repeal by the 21st Amendment in no way implies the 18th Amendment was unconstitutional (rather, it was just a bad idea).
Some have also questioned Amendment XVI
The 16th Amendment is not unconstitutional, and there is a plethora of pejorative descriptors for those who advocate otherwise.
So, again, there is nothing “unconstitutional” about the 14th Amendment, regardless of the (perceived) contradictions it may have created with other portions of the constitution.
seems like he’s arguing that every word in the constitution must be given a meaning, or else that word is useless
>>>no he isn’t, go back and read it again.
I think Donofrio’s problem (and the weirdness) is because he correctly interprets about 90% of what he reads, but then his reasoning puts him into a corner from which he cannot escape — so he uses tortured reasoning and imaginative leaps to get out of the box that his logic has locked him into.
The problem is that a straightforward reading of the law leads pretty clearly to the conclusion that “natural born Citizen” means the same as “native born citizen” and is co-extensive with the 14th Amendment’s reference to citizens “born” in the US.
Similarly, Donofrio correctly recognizes that the determination of Presidential eligibility is a power reserved to Congress by the Constitution, and that Congress is precluded from delegating that power… but then oddly comes up with the idea that the passage of a quo warranto statute is an “exercise” (rather than a “delegation”) of the power — which defies the plain meaning of the words “exercise” and “delegation”.
To Mr. Donofrio, Esq.
Well reasoned. Being a far left liberal attorney, I disagree with some of you arguments, but in order to have a healthly democracy it is imperative to have healthy reasoned discourse from all sides of the political spectrum.
Howerever what does make me livid is the vicious vituperation being spewed by Taitz and her cabal of fruit loops. They have no sense of civility and decorum. Through innuendo and rumorthey are trying to link Obama with 1960’s radical groups, the Communist Party, ODESSA, Wall Street moguls, the murder of a parishioner of his old UCC church, the Nazi Party, al Qaeda, 9/11, El Plan Espiritual de Aztlan, etc. Tiatz’s confrontation with Chief Justice Robets in Idaho is beyond belief. The best thing Taitz could do for America. is move back to Russia. But I digress.
Something to consider on the Natural-born issue: Based on Common Law the relationship between “citizen” and “Natural-born Citizen” is a follows:
1. The Class “Citizen” refers to all citizens.
2. There are two subclasses of “Citizen”: “Natural-born” and “Naturalized”. If you sre s citizen you are either natural-born or naturalized.
The following statements illustrate this:
If a natural-born citizen then a citizen. (TRUE)
If a naturalized citizen then a citizen. (TRUE)
If a citizen then a natural-born citizen. (FALSE)
If a citizen then a naturalized citizen. (FALSE)
If a citizen then either a natural-born citizen or naturalized citizen. (TRUE)
Bob,
That is untrue regarding amendments being Constitutional. Look no further than Amendment XVIII, which was repealed by Amendment XXI before the Supreme Court could deem it Unconstitutional based on violation of the Commerce Clause found in Article I of the U.S. Constitution.
Some have also questioned Amendment XVI
I read this a couple of times and he claims that we can throw out the 14th amendment as it pertains to determining citizenship for presidential elections but he never says exactly what that means.
It seems like he’s arguing that every word in the constitution must be given a meaning, or else that word is useless and would not be there. From this he concludes there must be a difference between a U.S. citizen and a natural-born citizen, or else naturn-born becomes a useless distinction.
Assuming that paraphasing of Donofrio is correct, I’ll let the students of logic find the flaw in that reasoning.
This amendment is Unconstitutional as it contradicts Article II.
An amendment to the constitution is, by definition, constitutional. Regardless of the (perceived) contradictions it may create.
Raising this challenge against both parties will force Intervention.
Standing. Mootness. Laches.
da verg,
In my opinion, even if a number of people call the State Bar (or whatever it is) to have her disbarred (or whatever other remedy detractors feel necessary), there is likely a process that would be instigated in order to verify that such complaints are legitimate (which I haven’t seen any evidence to support these kinds of claims).
In other words, just because someone sees a lawyer filing what they consider “frivolous” claims or appearing peacefully at a lecture and engaging in conversation with a federal official without causing a ruckus does not equate to anyone do anything even remotely unlawful.
-Phil
All Leo is saying is that if the framers wanted , in article 2, to allow all citizens to be eligible for president, the framers would have stated that. However, they didn’t say it. They used the term “natural born citizen”, they didn’t use “us citizen, they didn’t use “native born citizen, and they didn’t use “naturalized US citizen”. He is further pointing out that Ammendment 14 does not change Article 2 and that people saying otherwise are wrong.
That is it in a nutshell.
As far as cases are concerned Leo believes strongly that the only way to go is via DC court, Quo Warrento. In order to find out where Leo’s going with all this you really have to read his entire blog, and gain a feel for it, and not read piecemeal posts like what is presented here because then you get people spinning out on tangents on what Leo’s really trying to accomplish.
BTW Phil, keep up the good work on the postings, this site is one of the best in regard to the eligibility issues. i still disagree with the personal attacks that are allowed on this site. But it is your site. I hope nothing comes to Orly because of the misleading posts provided by some of the posters out to get her.
Donofrio’s posting is intresting but weird. It reads more like he is channeling Justice Marshall in a dream or a sceance [unneeded sarcasm]. I read this a couple of times and he claims that we can throw out the 14th amendment as it pertains to determining citizenship for presidential elections but he never says exactly what that means. Ah, there is the rub, since the writers of Article II didn’t define exactly what they meant by “Natural Born Citizen” the obvious place to look first is the Constituion and then to susequent legislation. Guess what? That leads us right to the 14th Amendment.
I think what Leo is saying is that we can toss out this pesky 14th amendment and perfrom an ad hoc interpretation of Article II that will conventiently allow for Obama to be removed through another process developed ad hoc. Sorry, I am not buying that and neither will any court.
Well, that settles that
Here lies yet another dead end for Donofrio.
The only real solution legally is to challenge the initial source. This will then directly challenge Congress based on the Consitutionality, or lack thereof, regarding Amendment XIV’s application to the eligibility and vetting of the candidates. This amendment is Unconstitutional as it contradicts Article II. Amendment XIV can be construed as a alteration in the core eligibility requirements for the President without explicitly amending them. We are clearly seeing the usage of the amendment as evident in so many of the uneducated responses from Senators and Representatives.
As such both the Republican and Democratic Parties responsible for vetting the candidates failed to vet both McCain and Soetoro properly. They are directly responsible for this issue as they were the ones who certified their candidates using Amendment XIV instead of Article II of the U.S. Constitution.
Raising this challenge against both parties will force Intervention. USC Title 28 § 2403 states that any Constitutional challenge arising from an Act of Congress, i.e. Amendment XIV vs Article II, would require the U.S. to become a plaintiff and the District Attorney of the United States would get involved. And since neither Congress, nor Obama, nor the United States are any defendents in this case, 2403 applies.
Orly’s class action suit is a perfect candidate for this type of tort. Sufficient evidence suggests both parties utilized Amendment XIV as sole eligibility for their candidates and active duty military are the ideal plaintiffs.