Apuzzo re McClure, Rodman, and Publius
nolu chanMay 28, 2012Brief on Behalf of Objectors, Kerchner and Laudenslager v. Obama, No. 85 MD2012, filed by Karen L. Kiefer, Esq.; on the brief, Mario Apuzzo, Esq., from pages58-60.
http://www.scribd.com/puzo1/d/92921415-Brief-on-Behalf-of-Objectors-in-Kerchner-Laudenslager-v-Obama-Pennsylvania-Ballot-Challenge-FILED-2-28-12Support for my position is found in an old article that has just recently surfaced. Aninternet researcher by the name rxsid of Free Republic has recently found this articleand provided it to Attorney Leo Donofrio who has recently published the article athis blog athttp://naturalborncitizen.files.wordpress.com/2011/12/alexandria-herald.pdf .This old article was published by Publius on October 7, 1811, in The AlexandriaHerald, concerning the “Case of James McClure,” which “made a great deal of stir in the U. States.” Mr. Donofrio infers that, given that “Publius” was the pseudonymused by Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, and John Jay in the Federalist Papersand that in 1811 Hamilton was dead and Jay retired, Publius is really JamesMadison. The Publius article states that McClure was born in the United States onApril 21, 1785. His father was a British subject at the time of his birth. On February20, 1786, his father naturalized to be a citizen under the laws of South Carolina.McClure remained in the United States until 1795 when he was sent to England for his education. He never returned to the United States. His father also returned to hiscountry, Great Britain. In 1807, McClure dispatched from England the ship, theHorizon, for Lima. The ship became wrecked on the sea rocks of Morlaix and never reached Lima. The incident resulted in the Berlin [59] Decree being first put intoeffect against the United States. Even though McClure had a U.S. passport issued tohim by the “American minister in London,” showing that he was a “native citizen of the United States,” the French Minister of War, based on information that hereceived from the French police and the “Minister plenipotentiary of the U. States,”issued an order on April 12, 1810 directing that McClure be detained in France as an
“English”
prisoner of France (emphasis in the original). Pursuant to that order,McClure was “placed under
surveillance
at Tours” (emphasis in the original). AJohn Rodman then took up the cause of having McClure released, contending thatMcClure was a “citizen” of the United States, and he wrote a letter from Paris datedJuly 4, 1811 to that effect to the Editor of the “United States Gazette.”
The namesof James McClure and John Rodman appear as names existing in ChesterCounty, South Carolina in the estate papers of Thomas Gillespie, who died in1808.
While it may be accurate that the names of James McClure and John Rodmanappear in the papers of Thomas Gillespie,
that
John Rodman is most certainly
not
the John Rodman relevant to the letter of 1811. The cited South Carolina Rodman
1
married Mary Jane Gillespie, the sister of Thomas Gillespie
2
and died in SouthCarolina in 1832.
3
The relevant John Rodman was a New York attorney, as I willshow.John Fenno founded and published the
Gazette of the United States
4
in New York City in 1789, moved to Philadelphia, and after several name changes became the
United States Gazette
.
5
It was a Hamiltonian Federalist paper, and Alexander Hamilton contributed financial assistance and articles under various pseudonyms.
6
James Madison and Thomas Jefferson urged Philip Freneau to found the
National Gazette,
7
an opposing paper also in Philadelphia.John Rodman (the relevant one) married Harriet Fenno,
8
the daughter of JohnFenno.John Rodman returned from France around 1811.
9
Completely fluent in French,
10
in 1814 he published his book,
The Commercial Code of France,
translated fromthe French,
11
with explanatory notes, and a complete analytical index. Rodmanwas the District Attorney for New York County from 1815-1817.
12
GulianVerplanck, a Congressman from New York, was his brother-in-law.
13
David BailieWarden was a consul to Paris who was removed by Minister to France Gen. JohnArmstrong in 1810.
14
Armstrong in turn was replaced in 1810.
15
Warden had someuseful connections to the likes of Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, and ElizaParke Custis
16
(granddaughter of Martha Washington). Using his connections,Warden returned to France in 1811.
17
Warden gave “aid in the personal affairs of New York attorney and merchant John Rodman (1775-1847) during his stay inFrance prior to 1811.”
18
Following a lengthy visit to France with his daughter, Rodman returned to theUnited States in 1818.
19
In May 1821, President Monroe appointed Rodman to the position of collector of the port of St. Augustine, Florida.
20
In 1822, he wrote tohis daughter, “I have had a complete set of the Spanish laws in six large volumessent to me from the Havana. These books I am obliged to study in the original, asthe Spanish laws, in civil causes, are still in force here.”
21
Rodman left his collector position around 1845 and returned north. He died in New Brunswick, New Jersey in February, 1847.
22
2
James Bowdoin was Ambassador to Spain. While in France, he requested thatArmstrong seek an invitation for him to a birthday event for the emperor. TheFrench declined as such invitations were for accredited ministers to France andBowdoin was only accredited to Spain. Bowdoin complained to Armstrong.Armstrong responded at length, ending with “General Armstrong hopes that Mr. Bwill hereafter look out for some new subject upon whom to discharge theirritations of ill-health or ill humor. He is completely weary of being the subject of either.”In a dispatch to Madison, Armstrong indicated “he had received information thatan agent in Madrid named McClure, representing a company of Liverpoolmerchants, was attempting to purchase the Floridas for eleven million dollars,allegedly to establish a huge slave depot there.” That may, or may not, have beenthe same McClure subsequently detained as an English prisoner of the French.
What is critical to understand about the McClure case and how Publius resolvedthe question of whether McClure was a “Citizen of the United States” is that itsupports my position in which I have steadfastly argued that the earlynaturalization acts applied not only to children born out of the United States butalso to children born in the United States and treated any child born in the UnitedStates to alien parents to be an alien also. Given these Congressional statutes, wecan reasonably conclude that our nation did not adopt the English common law jus soli concept of citizenship, but rather the law of nation’s jus sanguinis.
This appears to be based on that same scholarship and research which suggestedthat two random dudes named Rodman and McClure mentioned in the papers of some random dude named Gillespie, was relevant and indicative of due diligence.But there are always cases to be cited, federal and state, which contradict thenonsense that the United States adopted the Law of Nations (archaic, now calledInternational Law) concept of citizenship, either as phrased by Vattel or others.In
State v. Manuel,
23
4 Dev. & Bat. 20 (1838), the Supreme Court of North Carolinaaddressed the matter. (Boldface added for emphasis)At 24:According to the laws of this State, all human beings within it who arenot slaves, fall within one of two classes.
Whatever distinctions mayhave existed in the Roman law between citizens and freeinhabitants, they are unknown to our institutions. Before our
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Apuzzo re McClure, Rodman, Publius (citizenship, Obama)
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