PIJD Newsletter

This spring, Lauren Wright '27 and Tyler Hawes '28, two Public Interest J.D. (PIJD) students were selected to travel to Washington University School of Law to participate in the 2026 Model Constitutional Convention, joining law students from across the country in a unique simulation of constitutional reform and governance.  The Model Constitutional Convention brings together law students from across the country to engage in rigorous debate, negotiation, and collaborative problem-solving around complex constitutional issues. Participants work together to draft and refine constitutional provisions while developing skills in advocacy, leadership, coalition-building, and public service.

We are especially proud to share that one of our PIJD students was recognized with an Honorable Mention for Most Effective Leader, an award that celebrates exceptional leadership, collaboration, and contributions to the convention's deliberations.

The PIJD Program is committed to providing students with opportunities to engage in meaningful experiential learning beyond the classroom. We congratulate both students on representing Santa Clara Law with distinction and commend them for their thoughtful participation in this unique national program.

Read rising 2L Tyler Hawes reflection and proposal below:

              Over Memorial Day weekend, I had the honor of attending the second ever Model Constitutional Convention (MCC) in St. Louis, hosted by WashU Law. At the MCC, I acted in the role of a delegate from Nevada alongside my co-delegate. Together, we advocated for the needs of our state in an accurate, but condensed, simulation of an Article V constitutional convention. The program was complete with a professional parliamentarian who seamlessly navigated us through Robert's Rules of Order through committees and in plenary session.

            The Nevada delegation introduced an amendment proposal to preserve and slightly expand the scope of Section 1 of the 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution—the birthright citizenship clause. The text of the proposal is below, as well as a brief discussion of its aims. The idea was primarily my co-delegate's, who felt strongly about the role of birthright citizenship in American jurisprudence after recent re-interpretations by the Trump administration. As a Taiwanese immigrant, my co-delegate was impassioned to protect birthright citizenship, as he hopes to root his family in the United States after the completion of his J.D. at St. John's Law.

            We quickly came up against the dilemma which defeated our proposal in committee—how to write it to be both effective and worthy of broad support. Our proposal died via tug-of-war. The liberal states were unwilling to support the text of any watered-down version. Conservative states wouldn't take it as it was. We were unwilling to use a "parentage" test rather than a "soil" test. After a slew of amendments in hopes of finding common ground, it was abundantly clear that this idea was not a natural fit to advance to the plenary session.

            What went wrong? We thought this proposal would be easy to pass, as it minimally changes the application of the law. We wrongly believed we could build consensus around an issue with minimal splash on impact, around a policy twelve decades-tested since United States. v. Wong Kim Ark, 169 U.S. 649, 651 (1898).

            Ultimately, this was an insightful lesson on the role of political movements in policy advocacy. The issue of constitutionalizing birthright citizenship was not on my mind until Wong Kim Ark was challenged by the Trump administration; nobody seriously thought you could read the 14th Amendment any other way. We would not have introduced this amendment proposal if birthright citizenship were not under attack in Trump v. CASA, Inc., 606 U.S. 831 (2025) and Trump v. Barbara, No. 25-365 (U.S. argued Apr. 1, 2026). Downstream of these political events, birthright citizenship is a red-hot issue for the disruptor party and an albatross for the status-quo party. In my future policy advocacy, I will be more cautious before running headlong into the same problem, for fear of realizing all too late that my proposal is dead on arrival.

            I am thankful for the opportunity to have attended the MCC. The quality of the people involved was astonishing: students, organizers, mentors, and speakers. The caliber of our deliberation gives me hope for the future of our constitution. I would amply encourage future Santa Clara students to apply.

1. Title: An Amendment to Preserve and Fortify Birthright Citizenship
2. Nevada State Delegation; Aung Oo and Tyler Hawes
3. Submitted to Lexington and Concord & We the People Committees
4. Description: Clarifies aspects of the Fourteenth Amendment, Section 1
5. Discussion:
1. First, this proposal preserves birthright citizenship as imagined by the Fourteenth Amendment, and as interpreted by the United States Supreme Court in United States v. Wong Kim Ark, 169 U.S. 649 (1898), which has stood for over a century. (Short summary and excerpts)
2. Second, the proposal will henceforth expand birthright citizenship to include citizens of unincorporated U.S. territories, some of which are currently only granted citizenship by congressional statute, not as a legal right. For example, people born in American Samoa are U.S. "nationals" but not citizens, as they are unprotected by the 14th Amendment and are without legislation on point.
3. Third, the amendment clarifies that Congress has the power to enforce matters of birthright citizenship.
6. Text:

Section 1. All natural persons born within the geographic boundaries of the United States, or within any territory, possession, or district, subject to the sovereignty and jurisdiction of the United States, are citizens of the United States as a matter of right, notwithstanding preserved exceptions at common law.

Section 2. There is no legal distinction between incorporated and unincorporated territories concerning citizenship as a matter of birthright.

Section 3. Congress shall have the power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.