The nation's highest court has decided to review legal challenge disputing citizenship by birth.

The US Supreme Court has decided to review a pivotal case that challenges a historic guarantee: automatic citizenship for individuals born on American soil.

On day one in office this January, the administration issued an executive order aiming to halt the policy, but the order was struck down by federal courts after legal challenges were brought forward.

The Supreme Court's ultimate judgment will ultimately affirm citizenship rights for the offspring of migrants who are in the US undocumented or on non-immigrant visas, or it will overturn the provision altogether.

Next, the justices will calendar a session to hear the case between the federal government and plaintiffs, which include immigrant parents and their infants.

The Legal Foundation

For over a century and a half, the Fourteenth Amendment has established the principle that anyone born in the nation is a US citizen, with exceptions for children born to diplomats and personnel of foreign military forces.

"Every individual born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States."

The contested executive order sought to refuse citizenship to the children of people who are either in the US without legal status or are in the country on short-term status.

The United States is one of about 30 countries – mostly in the Western Hemisphere – that provide immediate citizenship to all those born on their soil.