Jus Soli

Before this class I had always assumed that every country offered birth right citizenship, at least to some degree; however, not only does the US fail to fully live up to Constitutionally mandated jus soli, only around thirty other nations offer jus soli, including Canada, Argentina, Chile, and Mexico, which means undocumented immigrants and their children are at even greater risk of having absolutely no records and documents.

Offering Birth Right Citizenship is by no means the only way to assist immigrants, particularly those without documents, and as seen with recent happenings in Texas, it is not always effective. Texas has created a catch-22 for undocumented parents who children were born in the US because in order for those parents to secure their child's birth certificate they must have US visas in addition to any foreign passports or other photo id. Thus, a id from a foreign consulate, which is the most accessible for undocumented immigrants is not taken by the Texan Vital Statistics office. And in order for undocumented parents to get the appropriate documentation, many times requires them to return to their home country, which then would make it extremely difficult for them to reenter the United States and would separate them from their family and job in the United States. Texas is attempting to portray this as an attempt to protect the privacy and identity of these children and/or punishing the undocumented parent, except instead they are rendering these children stateless, as they are not in many cases eligible for citizenship in their parents' country, and they cannot access the records that allow them to show their US citizenship and attend school, receive public benefits, or even medical care. Thus, Texas is imperiling not only the political lives and futures of these children, but is also harming their health and general well-being by preventing them from having access to their birthright citizenship.

Though as has been exemplified in the above example and in the abuses of the Dominican Republic against Dominicans of Haitian descent before and after the repeal of jus soli, jus soli is not an impenetrable force that protects people from statelessness or ensures citizenship, but the blatant disregard in the United States of the fourteenth amendment, the Nationality Act of 1940, and the Supreme Court Case of United States v Wong Kim Ark illustrates how the conceptions of illegality and criminality, the desire to limit citizenship to certain peoples (that is whites) are all vestiges of and continuation of the racism and brutality of inequality in this country, particularly towards Latino immigrants.