Speech #550154087

Many eminent persons claimed that no person was a citizen of the United Statesunless he was a citizen of some State composing the Union. This was never judicially decided prior to the enactment of the fourteenth amendment. That amendment provides thatAll persons born or naturalized in the United States. and subject to the jurisdiction thereof. are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside. Justice Miller. in the celebrated Slaughterhouse Cases (16 Wall. 73). in construing this amendment. said: It declares that a person may be a citizen of the United States without regard to their citizenship of a particular State. and it overturns the Dred Scott decision by making all persons born within the United States and subject to its jurisdiction citizens of the United States. * * * Not only may a man be a citizen of the United States without being a citizen of a State. but an important element is necessary to convert the former into the latter. He must reside in the State to make him a citizen of it. but it is only necessary that lie should be born or naturalized in the United States to make him a citizen of the Union.. In United States vs. Wingkin (169 U.