The Amendments to the Constitution

Amendments to the Constitution are first proposed by a two-thirds vote of both houses of Congress. Then, they must be approved by the legislatures of three-quarters of the states or by a vote of conventions in three-quarters of the states.

Since the addition of the Bill of Rights (the first 10 amendments) in 1791, the Constitution has been changed (amended) only 17 times, and one of those amendments simply canceled another. (The Seventeenth Amendment prohibited the manufacture and sale of alcoholic beverages; the Twenty-first Amendment repealed the Seventeenth Amendment. )

Probably the most significant portion of the Constitution is the Bill of Rights, the first 10 amendments to the Constitution. The first of these assures freedom of religion, speech, and the press and the right to complain to and about the government. Speech is protected no matter how unpopular or repulsive, so long as it does not create an im­mediate and serious danger to life or property. Free speech means that the government cannot prevent people from saying or writing whatever they want, nor can it punish people for expressing ideas that criticize the government. Free speech is at the very heart of democracy. Former Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis said that, for a democracy to work, people must be allowed to express new, unusual, and unpopular ideas so that they can be debated and examined and then adopted or rejected. After all, democracy itself was a new and strange idea in the eighteenth century, and it still is in many parts of the world.

Freedom of religion means that each person can belong (or not belong) to any religious group. An individual can follow any religion's teachings as long as these do not seriously interfere with the rights of others. Religious freedom also means that neither the federal government nor any state government can encourage or prevent the practice of religion. This idea has been called the wall of separation between church and state.

The Fourth, Fifth, Sixth, and Eighth Amendments protect people suspected or accused of crimes. But these amendments also protect all U.S. residents. Government of­ficials and police cannot arrest people or search them, their property, or their homes without some reason to believe that they have committed a crime.

Recently, the Second Amendment has created much discussion and controversy. This amendment deals with the right of people to keep and bear arms (guns). In view of the large number of guns in the U.S. and the increased use of them in committing crimes, especially murder, many people are recommending greater limitations on gun owner­ship and possession.

Certainly, the most important of the remaining amendments is the Fourteenth, which grew out of the Civil War. It was passed to protect former slaves from state laws that dis­criminated against them. But its effect has been much broader than that. It gives full federal and state citizenship to all people born in the U.S. or naturalized there (includ­ing former slaves). It prohibits states from violating the rights of American citizens. But the most significant provision is that no state may "deprive any person of life, liberty or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws." That means that all persons have equal legal rights and that their rights or possessions cannot be taken without a proper trial. These last provi­sions apply not only to U.S. citizens but to all persons in the country. Originally, the Bill of Rights did not protect people from state action, but only from federal action. The Fourteenth Amendment has been interpreted by the Supreme Court to apply almost all of the provisions in the Bill of Rights to the individual states. Thus, the Fourteenth Amendment is one of the most valuable protections that people living in the U.S. have.

Check your comprehension.

Name some of the most important rights granted in the Bill of Rights?

Why is the Fourteenth Amendment so important?