Supreme Court strikes down gender-based citizenship law

[garbon]

http://thehill.com/regulation/court-battles/337413-supreme-court-strikes-down-gender-based-citizenship-law

A unanimous Supreme Court on Monday stuck down a law that makes birthright citizenship harder for children of unwed fathers to obtain than children of unwed mothers.

The court held in an 8-0 ruling the gender line Congress drew in the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1952 is "incompatible" with the Firth Amendment's requirement that all people must be treated equally under the law.

The law requires unwed fathers to have 10 total years of U.S. residency, including five years after the age of 14, to confer citizenship on a child of theirs who is born overseas. Unwed American mothers, meanwhile, are only subject to a 1-year U.S. residency requirement to give their children U.S. citizenship.

In delivering the opinion of the court, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg said the equal protection infirmity in requiring a longer requirement for unwed fathers than for unwed mothers is clear. Nonetheless, the court couldn't grant Luis Ramon Morales-Santana — the plaintiff in the case — relief.

A convicted felon, Morales-Santana challenged the law after the Board of Immigration Appeals denied his claim that he was a U.S. citizen and couldn't be deported because his mother was Dominican and his father was American.

The board said Morales‐Santana's father had not satisfied the physical residency requirements for unwed fathers since he left the U.S. when he was 18 years old, 20 days shy of his 19th birthday and fifth year of residence in the U.S.

Ginsburg said it's up to Congress to decide whether to extend the shorter residency requirement to unwed fathers.

In the interim, she said the law's five-year requirement should apply, prospectively, to children born to unwed U.S.-citizen mothers.

Justice Neil Gorsuch took no part in considering or deciding this case.

[jimmy olsen]

I was happy until I got to the end.

It would have been better to lose the case. Now tons more people are going to get screwed over, and this congress won't lift a finger to help.

[garbon]

Well that would be a wholly political stance.

[jimmy olsen]

Well that would be a wholly political stance.

More of a moral stance,  but in this instance they're synonymous 

[grumbler]

Well that would be a wholly political stance.

More of a moral stance,  but in this instance they're synonymous

  High horse much?

[derspiess]

Nahhhhhh.

[dps]

Well that would be a wholly political stance.

More of a moral stance,  but in this instance they're synonymous

  High horse much?

Yeah, especially since Congress didn't have to allow children born overseas to US residents have citizenship at all.

[ulmont]

Yeah, especially since Congress didn't have to allow children born overseas to US residents have citizenship at all.

To be clear, the law in question only applies where the child is born ex-US to one US citizen and not two.