Presidential puzzle ? who <em>can</em> run?

Every presidential campaign generates its share of unique stories that are fodder for trivia contests, if nothing else.

As an example, consider the following: Which presidential campaign featured two major-party candidates who both faced allegations that they were ineligible for the office?

Answer? You guessed it ? our very own John McCain and Barack Obama.

Or maybe you didn?t guess it, because the story has largely flown under the radar. Is it possible that only constitutional law wonks care about whether a candidate is eligible for the highest office in the country?

Maybe so, but it can be an amusing puzzle for the rest of us as well. Here?s why. The Constitution provides only three qualifications for those who can serve as president. One of those qualifications is straightforward; you have to be 35 years old. The other two are a bit more vague, leaving them up to the interpretation of courts.

Here?s the entire relevant verbiage from Article II of the Constitution:

?No person except a natural born citizen, or a citizen of the United States, at the time of the adoption of this Constitution, shall be eligible to the office of President; neither shall any person be eligible to that office who shall not have attained to the age of thirty five years, and been fourteen Years a resident within the United States.?

The last part of that has never been relevant to my knowledge, but I think it could someday be up to a court to decide if those 14 years of residency were meant to be consecutive and immediately prior to running for the office, or cumulative and in any order.

But the sticking point this year is the ?natural born citizen? part of the equation.

John McCain, it turns out, was born in the Panama Canal Zone in 1936, when his father was stationed on a U.S. military base there. You would think that would not make him ineligible to be president, because after all both of his parents were U.S. citizens.

However, the authors of the Constitution did not define what they meant by ?natural born,? so it is anyone?s guess. In my mind it is more likely to outlaw presidents born by Caesarian delivery than ones born outside the country?s borders to legitimate citizens by natural childbirth. But, of course, no one asked my opinion.

Ultimately, the language of the Constitution also seems to be a bit ambiguous in another regard as well ? namely the commas that set off the phrase ?or a citizen of the United States? in the paragraph about qualifications.

Grammatically speaking, the sentence?s meaning is that, ?No person except a natural born citizen … at the time of the adoption of this Constitution, or a citizen of the United States, shall be eligible to the office of President.?

In other words, by the logic of grammar, the phrase ?or a citizen of the United States? stands alone and should mean that any citizen of the United States whether natural-born or not should be eligible to serve.

Of course, this has never been the interpretation of the clause, and would result in the possibility of immigrant presidents, but don?t rule that out from happening based on some future court?s decision about the meaning of the comma between ?a citizen of the United States? and ?at the time of the adoption of this Constitution.?

Chances are McCain would be found to be eligible in any case, but a law professor from the University of Arizona says he isn?t so sure. Gabriel J. Chin discovered a 1937 law which conferred citizenship on children of American parents who were born in the Canal Zone after 1904. He claims this meant that McCain was not a citizen at the time of his birth in 1936.

Of course, everyone knows that Congress passes many unnecessary laws, and this may just have been one more in a long line of them. Just because Congress ?granted? citizenship to McCain and others in 1937 doesn?t mean they didn?t already have it by some other means previously.

As for Barack Obama, his case is in some ways even more interesting, but only if you believe in skulduggery and deception in high places.

Obama, of course, was reportedly born in Hawaii in 1961. Assuming the date and place are correct, then Obama would be a natural-born citizen twice over because Hawaii was already a state at that time, and his mother was a U.S. citizen as well.

Unfortunately for Obama, some people have questioned whether he was actually born in Hawaii. If he had been born in Kenya, where his father lived, he would actually not be eligible to be president under the common interpretation of ?natural-born? citizen.

And oddly enough, Obama would not even be a U.S. citizen at all if he had been born in Kenya to an American mother because the relevant law that grants citizenship to foreign-born children with one non-American parent is pretty clear that the American parent at that time needed to have spent at least five years in the United States past the age of 14, although some sources say 16. Since Obama?s mother was just 18 when he was born, she could not have fulfilled this rule in either case.

Because of the importance of the issue, Obama?s campaign posted what is supposed to be his birth certificate at barackobama.com (do an Internet search for ?Barack Obama birth certificate? to find it for yourself). But the posting has done nothing but inflame the controversy.

For one thing, the birth certificate is of recent vintage, not an original one, or even a copy of an original. In addition, the certificate number has been blacked out so that it cannot be validated against any original. Moreover, there is no embossed seal or signature vouching for the authenticity of the birth certificate by any official of the state of Hawaii.

You would think it would be relatively easy for a man who wants to run the free world to obtain a certified birth certificate, but that does not seem to be the case.

Is this irrelevant or immaterial?

Gee, I hope not. Let?s get this straight again. There are three requirements to be president of the United States. All elected presidents have to meet all THREE requirements. If Obama were 33 years old, could we just say it?s not a big deal and pretend he is 35? Fat chance.

So let?s all be serious about both of these candidates and make sure we know what we are getting.

At a minimum it would be nice to know who in the government verifies eligibility to run for the highest office in the country. Or are we supposed to just hold the election first, and then sort it out later? Gee, that would be nice ? another election decided by the Supreme Court! Nothing like a good stiff constitutional crisis to wake you up in the morning.

Nonetheless, it is fairly apparent that most people aren?t serious about this issue, and don?t really care whether the candidates are in fact eligible to be president. All they really want is to see their candidate elected, and the devil take the hindmost.

Of course, you could make the case that another qualification for president is willingness to swear the oath of office, as dictated here in Article II:

?Before he enter on the execution of his office, he shall take the following oath or affirmation: ?I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will faithfully execute the office of President of the United States, and will to the best of my ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States.?

Hopefully, all of our candidates can meet that qualification at least. If not, we are doomed beyond my ability to describe.

? Frank Miele is managing editor of the Daily Inter Lake and writes a weekly column. E-mail responses may be sent to edit@dailyinterlake.com