The U.S. Supreme Court is set to rule on President Donald Trump's executive order ending birthright citizenship, drawing on 1960s precedents that affirm citizenship for those born on American soil regardless of parental status. These cases, often overlooked, involved denationalization efforts that affected over 120,000 Americans between 1946 and 1967. The rulings unanimously upheld the 14th Amendment's guarantee of citizenship by birth.
In the wake of President Donald Trump's Executive Order 14,160 signed on January 20, 2025, which denies automatic citizenship to children born in the United States unless at least one parent is a citizen or lawful permanent resident, the Supreme Court faces a pivotal decision. The order challenges the long-standing interpretation of the 14th Amendment's citizenship clause: "All 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."
Historical precedents from the mid-20th century provide strong support against the order. Following World War II, the U.S. government invoked the Nationality Act of 1940 to strip citizenship from native-born and naturalized Americans for actions like voting in foreign elections or evading the draft. Between 1945 and 1967, this affected 1,000 to 8,000 people annually, totaling more than 120,000, with a majority being native-born. The practice ceased after the Supreme Court's unanimous 1967 ruling in Afroyim v. Rusk declared such denationalization unconstitutional.
Nine denationalization cases reached the Court between 1955 and 1967, often dividing the justices 5-4. Yet, unanimity emerged on one point: birth in the United States confers citizenship irrespective of parents' foreign status. In the 1955 case of Gonzales v. Raich, Daniel Gonzales, born in New Mexico in 1924 to Mexican parents, was affirmed as a U.S. citizen despite living in Mexico and registering for its draft. During hearings, Justice Felix Frankfurter noted, "Doesn’t the Act establish he is a citizen?" and Gonzales's attorney replied, "That he is born in the United States," with Justice Stanley Reed adding, "That was admitted, wasn’t it?"
Similar affirmations appeared in 1958 rulings. In Perez v. Brownell, the Court described the petitioner as "a national of the United States by birth," born in Texas in 1909. In Nishikawa v. Dulles, Chief Justice Earl Warren wrote that the petitioner, born in California in 1916 to Japanese parents, was a citizen "by reason of that fact." The 1962 case of Mendoza-Martinez v. United States began by stating the petitioner, born in 1922, "acquired American citizenship by birth."
These decisions built on United States v. Wong Kim Ark (1898), which granted citizenship to a child of Chinese parents with permanent U.S. residence. The Trump administration argues that "subject to the jurisdiction" requires parental permanent residency, but the 1955-1967 precedents unanimously rejected parental status as relevant. Overturning them would require the current Court to discard its own settled law.
