Domicilicosis

Birthright citizenship left breathing, and Bolt Upright and Received Opinion are ON IT

BOLT UPRIGHT: Good evening, I’m Bolt Upright and this is Received Opinion!

[Sound of trolley problem victims being dragged to their deaths, with appropriate screaming. Screen behind UPRIGHT shows a cartoon Mexican man wearing a serape, pushing back his sombrero with one hand and wiping his brow in a classic “whew!” gesture with the other, with the Supreme Court in the background. Caption: THAT WAS CLOSE!]

UPRIGHT: The Supreme Court gave us a clutch of dramatic decisions this week, none more so than their ruling on birthright citizenship, which nearly all legal scholars said should obviously be affirmed based on the plain meaning of Section 1 of the 14th Amendment, a slam dunk constitutionally and a 9-0 decision in the world you and I used to live in. In this world, however, it was 6-3 — actually, 5-4, if you take into account Justice Kavanaugh’s separate dissent, which said that Trump’s proclamation on the matter was invalid, but if Congress ever reemerged from hiding and tried it, he’d back those citizen-strips faster than you can say vamanos!

[Background switches to a SCOTUS group shot, with the male Justices animated to show them rubbing their hands.]

Translation: Millions of citizens born in the U.S. to foreign-born parents should keep a suitcase packed — though to be fair the ICE agents who’ll perform your third country removal will probably just steal it anyway. A toothbrush, however, fits nicely in your jacket pocket.

[UPRIGHT pulls one out of his own jacket.]

See? You never know.

[UPRIGHT puts the toothbrush away and strolls to the little interview desk, where sits a tightly-wrapped white thirtysomething with a fash haircut and a five o’clock shadow, wearing a nice suit.]

To explain the bold new interpretation of the 14th Amendment that’s got the high court conservatives swooning, we have with us Professor Penebscott Parturition of the Ave Maria School of Law, author of No Se Puede: What The Founders Thought of Illegal Aliens. Professor, my understanding is not many legal experts questioned the meaning of Section 1 up till a few years ago, is that right?

PARTURITION: Not really, Bolt. In the 1960s there was a lawyer in Wyoming, Gus Trinkets, who made arguments that later inspired me and other birthright citizenship skeptics. Of course, thanks to liberal censorship, Trinkets’ work didn’t appear in traditional legal publications, nor did he have an academic position, and he had to disseminate his findings via what were then known as mimeographs, some of which Regnery Books collected and published ten years ago. He also gave speeches in public places such as laundromats and train stations, he was quite a character.

[Text of the 14th Amendment, Section 1 appears on background screen.]

UPRIGHT: OK, Professor, here’s the text, please tell us what we’re all missing.

PARTURITION: Ha ha, well, it’s really what the text is missing: the phrase “subject to the jurisdiction thereof” really means if the alleged citizen’s parents are domiciled in the United States.

UPRIGHT: So, do the parents have a domicile.

PARTURITION: Well, not in the sense you mean.

UPRIGHT: A domicile is a place you live.

PARTURITION: Not legally speaking.

UPRIGHT: What is it, legally speaking?

PARTURITION: It’s a place where the domiciled have a deeply established relationship with their habitation and their jurisdiction.

UPRIGHT: So, you mean they did a lot of work on the place? Like, a porch, new siding, or —

PARTURITION: No, I mean, they didn’t just drift or alight there.

UPRIGHT: Alight?

PARTURITION: Yes.

UPRIGHT: I just moved from the San Remo to a nice condo on Riverside Drive. Does that mean I wasn’t domiciled at the San Remo?

PARTURITION: No, look, it’s all in U.S. v. Wong Kim Ark.

UPRIGHT: So that decision explains what a domicile is.

PARTURITION: No, but the word appears frequently in it —

UPRIGHT: And they define it in the decision?

PARTURITON: [Increasingly exasperated] No, well, no, everyone back then knew what a domicile was —

UPRIGHT: Which is lost knowledge, apparently, since I certainly don’t know myself.

[PARTURITION rises, enraged.]

PARTURITION: Oh, it doesn’t matter whether you know or not! We know! And we almost had it within our grasp! Just one vote! Ah, but soon, soon we will have it all, and then it won’t matter what crappy people like you think or don’t think!

[PARTURITION rears back with his fists up like Bruno Ganz in the big Downfall scene.]

Soon, oh, soon, Gus Trinkets!

[PARTURITION staggers off.]

UPRIGHT: Well, I Am Not A Lawyer, as the kids say. Wonder what Bill Kunstler would have made of that. Anyway, on to the Decision Desk!

[Sound of someone trying to play “The Bells of St. Mary’s” by shooting pistols at tuned gongs as UPRIGHT goes to the Decision Desk, where are seated PEONI DOYENNE, wearing a red and black Liberowe Tamara printed silk-chiffon peplum blouse, a black Posse Emma linen midi skirt, and Aquazzura So Nude 50 leather slingback sandals; and CHAFE DRAMATURGY, wearing a Haspel Purple Haze seersucker jacket and shorts, white crew socks, and Bass Weejuns two-tone penny loafers.

UPRIGHT: Chafe, saw your column in the Times — you seem to think the issue’s settled for good and all.

DRAMATURGY: Bolt, you know a lot of socialists want to [air quotes] reform the Court, and I admit they do disappoint me a lot, but I agree with Chuck Schumer, they sure got this one right.

UPRIGHT: And you assume enemies of birthright citizenship, having gotten close, will now just give up.

DRAMATURGY: Well, that’s what I would do in their position!

UPRIGHT: Peoni, I suppose your household staff is breathing a sigh of relief right now.

DOYENNE: Oh, Bolt, none of my people are affected by this.

UPRIGHT: You mean they’re not immigrants or children of immigrants?

DOYENNE: I mean they don’t speak English so they don’t know what’s going on. What, do you think I talk shop with the help? Besides, I replaced all the little tacos with Bosnians, and I doubt ICE will coming looking for them, if you know what I mean.

UPRIGHT: I certainly do. [To the camera] When we return, we’ll be joined by Christopher Rufo, who’ll ask why liberals can’t be more like Ezra Klein, and Ezra Klein, who’ll ask why more conservatives can’t be like Christopher Rufo.

[Sound of a full taxi stand being dropped from a great height, and bouncing; camera pulls away, immediately achieving hyperspeed, leaving blinding light trails.]