Are only citizens &quot;at the time of the adoption of this Constitution&quot; eligible to be President?
<p>While reading <a href="https://law.stackexchange.com/a/7185/194">this answer</a>, I noticed some odd wording in <a href="https://www.law.cornell.edu/constitution/articleii#section1" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Article II, Section 1 of the Constitution</a> (emphasis mine):</p>

<blockquote>
  <p>No person except a natural born citizen, or a citizen of the United States, <strong>at the time of the adoption of this Constitution</strong>, 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.</p>
</blockquote>

<p>Does this mean that, to be eligible for the office of President, one must have been a citizen <em>when the Constitution was signed</em> or otherwise 'adopted', presumably years ago? If not, what does "at the time of the adoption" mean in this context?</p>

<p>No, it means the following are eligible:</p>

<ul>
<li>Natural born citizens</li>
<li>Citizens of the United States, at the time of the adoption of the constitution</li>
</ul>

<p>The second part was to allow people that were citizens of the US in 1788 (but were obviously not "natural born citizens", since the US didn't exist when they were born) to be eligible for the Presidency.</p>

<p>Check out <a href="http://memory.loc.gov/cgi-bin/ampage?collId=llfr&amp;fileName=003/llfr003.db&amp;recNum=632&amp;itemLink=r%3Fammem%2Fhlaw%3A@field%28DOCID%2B@lit%28fr0032%29%29%230030003&amp;linkText=1">Alexander Hamilton's draft</a> of this clause:</p>

<blockquote>
  <p>No person shall be eligible to the office of President of the United States unless he be <em>now a Citizen of one of the States</em>, or hereafter be born a Citizen of the United States.</p>
</blockquote>

<p>The drafters of the Constitution and Bill of Rights did seem to wield commas like blunt instruments to smash into sentences (see the 2nd Amendment). The intention is clear if the comma after 'United States' is taken out:</p>

<p>"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;" </p>

united-states us-constitution legal-terms