Birthright Citizenship

 I can understand the feeling that citizenship should mean something (I'm not sure how much--we'll come back to that). However, it should not be a political football, which it surely is. My question is, notwithstanding marriage and naturalization, what makes someone a citizen?

Your parents were citizens. Perhaps they were granted citizenship by naturalization or marriage, but that is clearly the minority case. You presume you are a citizen because you presume your parents are citizens because they .... As you see, this goes on and on. The naturalization process began in 1790, and the visa process began in 1917, but both have gone through many iterations. Records are lost. Many simply never went through the hoops. Slaves were imported, and the records, once they got here, are unreliable. I'd take a wild guess that at 80-90% of the people here couldn't prove anything, and that it would present a considerable expense to many of those that could (genealogy research).  Is the ability to do or fund or research a condition of citizenship? I think not.

An enormous practical problem. Unsolvable, in any practical sense, I think.

Assign a future cut-off date to birthright citizenship.  Still a huge practical problem, but not so different from voter logs and social security.

But what right does a country have, really, to restrict citizenship? The Americas were found by the First People, and they worked for it. Then the others came and stole it in a murderous fashion.every land, every where, in every corner of the world, was taken at the point of a sword. No fairness. I don't feel that I'm entitled to this place than those who would come and join us. As far as the "my ancestors built this land," that's a stinking pile of malarkey. Everyone's ancestors built something or didn't build something, but that wasn't you. The American dream, after all, is built on what YOU can do. Let other people build their history. And by the way, we need the help. The real measure of citizenship is did you work for it? But how do we measure "work?"

 I get the problem of wide open boarders. You need a valve.  That can and is done by regulation, not amendment. 

A hornet's nest.  An amendment will not happen. We can't get 2/3 to agree it's Tuesday. And if it did happen, it would have to be detailed to be fair. But details change as societies change, and the details should not be subject tot the whims of political winds. In today's (and the future) environment, every syllable would be measured not by fairness, but by voter count.  

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 We have the 14th amendment because of the most ghastly act of civil rights violation the world has ever seen; about 12 million in the transatlantic trade alone, plus all of their descendants. It's not just quietly going away. 

The 14th amendment has become a fundamental and positive characteristic of the United States, just as the Constitution is our bedrock. Birthright citizenship is something we should be proud of. It doesn't need fixed.