Rep. Lamar Smith, the new chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, is introducing himself to the American people. Someone should have told him to get his facts straight before talking about important issues affecting the lives of millions of people.

Smith had a letter published in the LA Times earlier this week, saying:

Congress should act to end birth citizenship for three reasons. … [T]hird, during the debate on the 14th Amendment in 1866, a senator who helped draft the amendment said it would "not of course include persons born in the United States who are foreigners."

Actually, as Media Matters pointed out long ago, that quotation cuts out the rest of the sentence, a change that completely alters its meaning. The actual quote is:

[The amendment would] not, of course, include persons born in the United States who are foreigners, aliens, who belong to the families of ambassadors or foreign ministers accredited to the Government of the United States, but will include every other class of persons. (emphasis added)

So, contrary to Smith’s assertion, the quote was limited to children born to diplomats.

Changing the comma to a period and eliminating the most important part of the sentence may serve the far right’s anti-constitutional agenda, but it doesn’t serve the cause of truth or civil debate, and it doesn’t help Rep. Smith gain the trust of the American people. On a matter as central to American liberty as the Fourteenth Amendment, he needs to get his facts straight.