User:Jaydavidmartin/Fitisemanu v. United States

Fitisemanu v. United States, [fix: 386 U.S. 547 (1967)], is an ongoing United States court case regarding birthright citizenship in American Samoa.

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Background

In the United States, the Citizenship Clause of the 14th Amendment to the United States Constitution grants birthright citizenship to all people born in the United States, regardless of the citizenship status of their parents. Specifically, the clause reads:

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.

However, people born in American Samoa, an unincorporated territory of the United States, are not extended citizenship at birth; rather, they are born non-citizen nationals. This unique status of American Samoans arises from a series of controversial early twentieth century Supreme Court cases known as the Insular Cases, which defined the legal status of US territories. The Court ruled that full constitutional protection of rights does not automatically (or ex proprio vigore—i.e., of its own force) extend to all places under American control. It established the principle of territorial incorporation, which distinguished between territories considered to be on the path to statehood (incorporated) and those not on the path to statehood (unincorporated). The Court ruled that the Constitution applies fully only to incorporated territories (which at the time included places like Alaska and Hawaii), while in unincorporated territories, which today includes American Samoa, Guam, the Northern Marianas Islands, the U.S. Virgin Islands, and Puerto Rico, the Constitution "[does] not apply in full".

The Supreme Court gave Congress the power to extend rights to unincorporated territories. It has done so in a number of ways, including extending birthright citizenship to Puerto Rico, Guam, the U.S. Virgin Islands, and the Northern Marianas Islands. It has not, however, extended it to American Samoa, leaving all people born in American Samoa non-citizen nationals. In Fitisemanu v. United States, John Fitisemanu, as well as two other non-citizen nationals born in American Samoa, are suing the federal government, arguing that restricting the status of those born in American Samoa to non-citizen nationals is a violation of the Citizenship Clause.

A similar case, Tuaua v. United States (2012), challenged the status of American Samoans. In that case, the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit ruled 3–0 that birthright citizenship does not extend to American Samoans, relying on the precedent established by the Insular Cases. In 2016, the Supreme Court denied certiorari, leaving the lower court's ruling standing.

Decision

On December 12, 2019, Judge Clark Waddoups of the United States District Court for the District of Utah issued a memorandum decision finding that individuals born in American Samoa enjoy birthright citizenship under the Citizenship Clause of the 14th Amendment". The next day, however, the same judge issued a stay on the order pending the resolution of the case on appeal.