What is the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment?
The Equal Protection Clause is located at the end of Section 1 of the Fourteenth Amendment: All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside.
What is the difference between the era and the Fourteenth Amendment?
Most of these provisions mirror the broad language of the ERA, while the wording in others resembles the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. The 1879 Constitution of California contains the earliest state equal rights provision on record.
What is the full text of the 14th Amendment?
The full text of the amendment is: All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the state wherein they reside.
What is the Equal Rights Amendment in the United States Constitution?
Narrowly written, it limits the equal rights conferred to "entering or pursuing a business, profession, vocation, or employment". Near the end of the 19th century two more states, Wyoming (1890) and Utah (1896), included equal rights provisions in their constitutions.
In which Amendment does the Equal Protection Clause appear?
14th Amendment The Fourteenth AmendmentThe Fourteenth Amendment addresses many aspects of citizenship and the rights of citizens. The most commonly used -- and frequently litigated -- phrase in the amendment is "equal protection of the laws", which figures prominently in a wide variety of landmark cases, including Brown v.
What did the 14th Amendment do?
A major provision of the 14th Amendment was to grant citizenship to “All persons born or naturalized in the United States,” thereby granting citizenship to formerly enslaved people.
What was the 14th Amendment in simple terms?
The 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, ratified in 1868, granted citizenship to all persons born or naturalized in the United States—including former enslaved people—and guaranteed all citizens “equal protection of the laws.” One of three amendments passed during the Reconstruction era to abolish slavery and ...
What does the 15th Amendment say?
FIFTEENTH AMENDMENT The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of race, color, or previous condition of ser- vitude.
When was the 15th Amendment passed?
February 26, 186915th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution: Voting Rights Passed by Congress February 26, 1869, and ratified February 3, 1870, the 15th amendment granted African American men the right to vote.
Why is the 15th Amendment Important?
The 15th Amendment guaranteed African-American men the right to vote. Almost immediately after ratification, African Americans began to take part in running for office and voting.
What are the 13th 14th and 15th Amendments?
The 13th Amendment abolished slavery. The 14th Amendment gave citizenship to all people born in the US. The 15th Amendment gave Black Americans the right to vote.
When was the 19th Amendment passed?
June 4, 1919Approved by the Senate on June 4, 1919, and ratified in August 1920, the Nineteenth Amendment marked one stage in women's long fight for political equality. This timeline features key moments on the Senate's long road to the ratification of the Nineteenth Amendment to the Constitution.
What is the 15th Amendment Apush?
15th Amendment - (Political) The 15th amendment quickly passed by Republicans that forbade either the federal government or the states from denying citizens the right to vote on the basis of race, color, or "previous conditions of servitude". Set up the foundation for future equal opportunity laws.
What did the 16th Amendment do?
The Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes on incomes, from whatever source derived, without apportionment among the several States, and without regard to any census or enumeration.
What is the 14 and 15 Amendment?
The Fourteenth Amendment, adopted in 1868, defines all people born in the United States as citizens, requires due process of law, and requires equal protection to all people. The Fifteenth Amendment, ratified in 1870, prevents the denial of a citizen's vote based on race, color, or previous condition of servitude.
What did the 17th amendment do?
Passed by Congress on May 13, 1912, and ratified on April 8, 1913, the 17th Amendment modified Article I, Section 3, of the Constitution by allowing voters to cast direct votes for U.S. senators. Prior to its passage, senators were chosen by state legislatures.
What is the Fourteenth Amendment?
The Fourteenth Amendment is an amendment to the United States Constitution that was adopted in 1868. It granted citizenship and equal civil and leg...
When was the Fourteenth Amendment ratified?
The Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States was submitted for ratification on June 16, 1866, and on July 28, 1868, it was rat...
What does the Fourteenth Amendment forbid?
The Fourteenth Amendment forbids the states from depriving any person of “life, liberty, or property, without due process of law” and from denying...
Which amendment guarantees equal protection?
By its terms, the clause restrains only state governments. However, the Fifth Amendment 's due process guarantee, beginning with Bolling v. Sharpe (1954), has been interpreted as imposing some of the same restrictions on the federal government: "Though the Fifth Amendment does not contain an equal protection clause, as does the Fourteenth Amendment which applies only to the States, the concepts of equal protection and due process are not mutually exclusive." In Lawrence v. Texas (2003) the Supreme Court added: "Equality of treatment and the due process right to demand respect for conduct protected by the substantive guarantee of liberty are linked in important respects, and a decision on the latter point advances both interests" Some scholars have argued that the Court's decision in Bolling should have been reached on other grounds. For example, Michael W. McConnell has written that Congress never "required that the schools of the District of Columbia be segregated." According to that rationale, the segregation of schools in Washington D.C. was unauthorized and therefore illegal.
What is the Equal Protection Clause?
t. e. The Equal Protection Clause is part of the first section of the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution. The clause, which took effect in 1868, provides "nor shall any State ... deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws".
What did Bingham say about equality?
Bingham said in a speech on March 31, 1871 that the clause meant no State could deny to anyone "the equal protection of the Constitution of the United States ... [or] any of the rights which it guarantees to all men", nor deny to anyone "any right secured to him either by the laws and treaties of the United States or of such State." At that time, the meaning of equality varied from one state to another.
Why did the federal government create race conscious programs during the reconstruction?
During Reconstruction, Congress enacted race-conscious programs primarily to assist newly freed slaves who had personally been denied many advantages earlier in their lives. Such legislation was enacted by many of the same people who framed the Equal Protection Clause, though that clause did not apply to such federal legislation, and instead only applied to state legislation. Likewise, the Equal Protection Clause does not apply to private universities and other private businesses, which are free to practice affirmative action unless prohibited by federal statute or state law.
Why was the 14th amendment important?
A primary motivation for this clause was to validate the equality provisions contained in the Civil Rights Act of 1866, which guaranteed that all citizens would have the guaranteed right to equal protection by law. As a whole, the Fourteenth Amendment marked a large shift in American constitutionalism, by applying substantially more constitutional restrictions against the states than had applied before the Civil War .
What did the Alabama Supreme Court rule in 1872?
In 1872, the Alabama Supreme Court ruled that the state's ban on mixed-race marriage violated the "cardinal principle" of the 1866 Civil Rights Act and of the Equal Protection Clause. Almost a hundred years would pass before the U.S. Supreme Court followed that Alabama case ( Burns v. State) in the case of Loving v.
Which amendments prohibit voting based on race?
The Supreme Court ruled in Nixon v. Herndon (1927) that the Fourteenth Amendment prohibited denial of the vote based on race.
Which amendment was intended to end segregation?
Historians have debated whether the Fourteenth Amendment was intended to end such segregation, but in Plessy v. Ferguson (1896), the Court ruled by a 7-1 vote that so-called “separate but equal” facilities (in that case, train cars) for blacks and whites did not violate the Equal Protection Clause.
What was the Equal Protection Clause intended to do?
Julius L. Chambers Distinguished Professor of Law and Director of the Center for Civil Rights at the University of North Carolina School of Law. Ratified as it was after the Civil War in 1868, there is little doubt what the Equal Protection Clause was intended to do: stop states from discriminating against blacks.
When did subordination end?
Lest we think that these facts have no contemporary significance, it bears remembrance that legalized subordination of African Americans did not end with the Thirteenth Amendment in 1865, or even in 1868 with the adoption of the Fourteenth Amendment. It was a continuum which only began to end with Brown v. Board of Education in 1954 and the Civil Rights Era legislation and jurisprudence of the 1960s. Bakke ’s assault on the remedial imperative began a mere ten years after the beginning of the end of the subordination continuum. Even today, since the involuntary arrival of African Americans began in what is now the United States, nine out of every ten of their days have been spent in slavery and Jim Crow segregation, as have eight of every ten days since the adoption of the Declaration of Independence. Jurisprudence and discourse that disembodies present day racial inequality from our history of legally imposed racial subordination is either tone deaf to history or intellectually dishonest, as is the notion that there is moral or legal symmetry between efforts to address the effects of that history, on the one hand, and invidious discrimination, on the other. The Fourteenth Amendment continues to call to us. Even while it has other, no less important, work to do, it its original work is unfinished.
What is the Supreme Court's Equal Protection Clause?
The Supreme Court has also used the Equal Protection Clause to prohibit discrimination on other bases besides race. Most laws are assessed under so-called “rational basis scrutiny.”. Here, any plausible and legitimate reason for the discrimination is sufficient to render it constitutional.
Why is the Fifth Amendment read?
For example, despite its reference to “state [s],” the Clause has been read into the Fifth Amendment to prevent the federal government from discriminating as well. Near the end of the nineteenth century, the Court considered whether racial segregation by the government violated the Constitution.
Which amendment is invalidated by Seattle School District No. 1?
There is no question that the Fourteenth Amendment , by its own terms, applies to all people.
Which court held that laws prohibiting interracial marriages violated Equal Protection?
Virginia that the Supreme Court held that laws prohibiting interracial marriages violated Equal Protection.
Which amendment guarantees equal protection of the laws?
The 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, ratified in 1868, granted citizenship to all persons born or naturalized in the United States—including former enslaved people—and guaranteed all citizens “equal protection of the laws.”.
What is the 14th amendment?
Constitution, ratified in 1868, granted citizenship to all persons born or naturalized in the United States—including former enslaved people—and guaranteed all citizens “equal protection of the laws.” One of three amendments passed during the Reconstruction era to abolish slavery and establish civil and legal rights for Black Americans, it would become the basis for many landmark Supreme Court decisions over the years.
Why did the Southern states resisted the 13th and 14th amendments?
Southern states also resisted, but Congress required them to ratify the 13th and 14th Amendments as a condition of regaining representation in Congress, and the ongoing presence of the Union Army in the former Confederate states ensured their compliance.
Which amendment repealed the 3/5ths clause?
Section Two of the 14th Amendment repealed the three-fifths clause (Article I, Section 2, Clause 3) of the original Constitution, which counted enslaved people as three-fifths of a person for the purpose of apportioning congressional representation.
What is the Supreme Court's interpretation of the Bill of Rights?
Over time, the Supreme Court has interpreted this clause to guarantee a wide array of rights against infringement by the states, including those enumerated in the Bill of Rights (freedom of speech, free exercise of religion, right to bear arms, etc.) as well as the right to privacy and other fundamental rights not mentioned elsewhere in the Constitution.
Which amendment defines citizenship?
The opening sentence of Section One of the 14th Amendment defined U.S. citizenship: “All persons born or naturalized in the United States and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside.”
Which amendment states that no state can deprive a person of life, liberty, or property?
The third clause, “nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty or property, without due process of law,” expanded the due process clause of the Fifth A mendment to apply to the states as well as the federal government.
What amendments are included in the Encyclopaedia Britannica?
Encyclopaedia Britannica's editors oversee subject areas in which they have extensive knowledge, whether from years of experience gained by working on that content or via study for an advanced degree.... Fourteenth Amendment, amendment (1868) to the Constitution of the United States that granted citizenship ...
Which amendment gave equal rights to African Americans?
Fourteenth Amendment, amendment (1868) to the Constitution of the United States that granted citizenship and equal civil and legal rights to African Americans and slaves who had been emancipated after the American Civil War, including them under the umbrella phrase “all persons born or naturalized in the United States.”.
What amendments were passed after the Civil War?
Read More on This Topic. Constitution of the United States of America: The Fourteenth Amendment. After the American Civil War, three new constitutional amendments were adopted: the Thirteenth (1865), which abolished slavery; the Fourteenth... This so-called Reconstruction Amendment prohibited the states from depriving any person of “life, liberty, ...
How are representatives apportioned among the states?
Representatives shall be apportioned among the several states according to their respective numbers, counting the whole number of persons in each state, excluding Indians not taxed. But when the right to vote at any election for the choice of electors for President and Vice President of the United States, Representatives in Congress, the executive and judicial officers of a state, or the members of the legislature thereof, is denied to any of the male inhabitants of such state, being twenty-one years of age, and citizens of the United States, or in any way abridged, except for participation in rebellion, or other crime, the basis of representation therein shall be reduced in the proportion which the number of such male citizens shall bear to the whole number of male citizens twenty-one years of age in such state.
How many sections are there in the 14th amendment?
In all, the amendment comprises five sections, four of which began in 1866 as separate proposals that stalled in legislative process and were later amalgamated, along with a fifth enforcement section, into a single amendment. The first page of the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States of America.
Which amendment is on the first page?
The first page of the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States of America.
Which amendment prohibited the states from depriving any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law?
This so-called Reconstruction Amendment prohibited the states from depriving any person of “life, liberty, or property, without due process of law” and from denying anyone within a state’s jurisdiction equal protection under the law.
What is the ERA amendment?
(April 2021) The Equal Rights Amendment ( ERA) is a proposed amendment to the United States Constitution designed to guarantee equal legal rights for all American citizens regardless of sex.
Who brought the Equal Rights Amendment to the House?
On August 10, 1970, Michigan Democrat Martha Griffiths successfully brought the Equal Rights Amendment to the House floor, after 15 years of the joint resolution languishing in the House Judiciary Committee.
What party supported the ERA?
The Republican Party included support of the ERA in its platform beginning in 1940, renewing the plank every four years until 1980. The ERA was strongly opposed by the American Federation of Labor and other labor unions, which feared the amendment would invalidate protective labor legislation for women. Eleanor Roosevelt and most New Dealers also opposed the ERA. They felt that ERA was designed for middle-class women, but that working-class women needed government protection. They also feared that the ERA would undercut the male-dominated labor unions that were a core component of the New Deal coalition. Most Northern Democrats, who aligned themselves with the anti-ERA labor unions, opposed the amendment. The ERA was supported by Southern Democrats and almost all Republicans.
What did Eisenhower promise to women everywhere?
Eisenhower had publicly promised to "assure women everywhere in our land equality of rights," and in 1958, Eisenhower asked a joint session of Congress to pass the Equal Rights Amendment, the first president to show such a level of support for the amendment.
What is the purpose of the ERA?
e. The Equal Rights Amendment ( ERA) is a proposed amendment to the United States Constitution designed to guarantee equal legal rights for all American citizens regardless of sex. It seeks to end the legal distinctions between men and women in matters of divorce, property, employment, and other matters.
How many states have equal rights?
Twenty-five states have adopted constitutions or constitutional amendments providing that equal rights under the law shall not be denied because of sex. Most of these provisions mirror the broad language of the ERA, while the wording in others resembles the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. The 1879 Constitution of California contains the earliest state equal rights provision on record. Narrowly written, it limits the equal rights conferred to "entering or pursuing a business, profession, vocation, or employment". Near the end of the 19th century two more states, Wyoming (1890) and Utah (1896), included equal rights provisions in their constitutions. These provisions were broadly written to ensure political and civil equality between women and men. Several states crafted and adopted their own equal rights amendments during the 1970s and 1980s, while the ERA was before the states, or afterward.
When was the ERA ratified?
Ratifications. On March 22, 1972 , the ERA was placed before the state legislatures, with a seven-year deadline to acquire ratification by three-fourths (38) of the state legislatures. A majority of states ratified the proposed constitutional amendment within a year.
Which amendment prohibits states from denying to any person the equal protection of the laws?
The Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, one of three amendments adopted in the immediate aftermath of the American Civil War (1861–65), prohibits states from denying to any person “the equal protection of the laws.”.
When was the equal protection clause circumvented?
Indeed, for nearly 80 years after the adoption of the Fourteenth Amendment, the intent of the equal protection clause was effectively circumvented. As late as 1927, Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., referred to equal protection as “the usual last resort of constitutional arguments.”. Not until the landmark Brown v.
Which Supreme Court case ruled that a selective recount of ballots in the state of Florida violated the Equal Protection?
Gore (2000), which stemmed from the controversial presidential election of that year, the Supreme Court’s ruling that a selective recount of ballots in the state of Florida violated the equal protection clause helped to preserve George W. Bush ’s narrow win in that state and in the electoral college.
Which amendments protect against arbitrary or repressive acts of government?
Supreme Court of the United States: Historical trends. …the Fifth Amendment and the equal-protection clause of the Fourteenth Amendment have been the principal sources of protection of persons and corporations against arbitrary or repressive acts of government.
What was the Board of Education decision in 1954?
Board of Education (1954) decision did the court reverse its decision in Plessy and declare racial segregation unconstitutional. Under Chief Justice Earl Warren in the 1960s, the concept of equal protection was dramatically transformed and applied to cases involving welfare benefits, exclusionary zoning, municipal services, and school financing.
Overview
The Equal Protection Clause is part of the first section of the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution. The clause, which took effect in 1868, provides "nor shall any State ... deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws". It mandates that individuals in similar situations be treated equally by the law.
A primary motivation for this clause was to validate the equality provisions contained in the Civil …
Text
The Equal Protection Clause is located at the end of Section 1 of the Fourteenth Amendment:
All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside. No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to a…
Background
Though equality under the law is an American legal tradition arguably dating to the Declaration of Independence, formal equality for many groups remained elusive. Before passage of the Reconstruction Amendments, which included the Equal Protection Clause, American law did not extend constitutional rights to black Americans. Black people were considered inferior to white Americans, a…
Ratification
With the return to originalist interpretations of the Constitution, many wonder what was intended by the framers of the reconstruction amendments at the time of their ratification. The 13th amendment abolished slavery but to what extent it protected other rights was unclear. After the 13th amendment the South began to institute Black Codes which were restrictive laws seeking to keep black Americans in a position of inferiority. The 14th amendment was ratified by nervous R…
Early history following ratification
Bingham said in a speech on March 31, 1871 that the clause meant no State could deny anyone "the equal protection of the Constitution of the United States ... [or] any of the rights which it guarantees to all men", nor deny to anyone "any right secured to him either by the laws and treaties of the United States or of such State." At that time, the meaning of equality varied from one state to anot…
Gilded Age interpretation and the Plessy decision
In the United States, 1877 marked the end of Reconstruction and the start of the Gilded Age. The first truly landmark equal protection decision by the Supreme Court was Strauder v. West Virginia (1880). A black man convicted of murder by an all-white jury challenged a West Virginia statute excluding blacks from serving on juries. Exclusion of blacks from juries, the Court concluded, was a denial of …
Between Plessy and Brown
In Missouri ex rel. Gaines v. Canada (1938), Lloyd Gaines was a black student at Lincoln University of Missouri, one of the historically black colleges in Missouri. He applied for admission to the law school at the all-white University of Missouri, since Lincoln did not have a law school, but was denied admission due solely to his race. The Supreme Court, applying the separate-but-equal principle of Ples…
Brown and its consequences
In 1954 the contextualization of the equal protection clause would change forever. The Supreme Court itself recognized the gravity of the Brown v Board decision acknowledging that a split decision would be a threat to the role of the Supreme Court and even to the country. When Earl Warren became Chief Justice in 1953, Brown had already come before the Court. While Vinson was still Chie…