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The first ten amendments were adopted and ratified simultaneously and are known collectively as the Bill of Rights. The 13th, 14th, and 15th amendments are collectively known as the Reconstruction Amendments. Six amendments adopted by Congress and sent to the states have not been ratified by the required number of states.
- First Amendment
- Second Amendment
- Third Amendment
- Fourth Amendment
- Fifth Amendment
- Sixth Amendment
- Seventh Amendment
- Eighth Amendment
- Ninth Amendment
- 10th Amendment
In order to secure support for the Constitution among Anti-Federalists, who feared it gave too much power to the national government at the expense of individual states, James Madison agreed to draft a Bill of Rights during the first session of Congress. Of these first 10 amendments, the First Amendment is arguably the most famous and most importan...
The text of the Second Amendment reads: “A well-regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.” During the Revolutionary War era, “militia” referred to groups of men who banded together to protect their communities, towns, coloniesand eventually states. Diff...
This amendment prohibits the quartering of militia in private homes in either war or peacetime without consent of the homes’ owners. As a reaction against past laws allowing British soldiers to take shelter in colonists’ homes whenever they wanted, the Third Amendmentdoesn’t appear to have much constitutional relevance today, as the federal governm...
The Fourth Amendment’s guarantee of “the right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures” also grew directly out of colonial Americans’ experiences prior to the Revolutionary War. Most notably, British authorities made use of general warrants, which were court orders that all...
In addition to the famous right to refuse to testify against oneself (or “plead the Fifth”), the Fifth Amendment establishes other key rights for defendants in criminal proceedings, including the need for formal accusation by a grand jury and the protection against double jeopardy, or being tried for the same crime twice. It also requires the feder...
The Sixth Amendment also deals with protecting the rights of people against possible violations by the criminal justice system. It ensures the right to a public trial by an impartial jury without a significant delay and gives defendants the right to hear the charges against them, call and cross-examine witnesses and retain a lawyer to defend them i...
With the Seventh Amendment, Madison addressed two Anti-Federalist concerns: that the document failed to require jury trials for civil (non-criminal) cases, and that it gave the Supreme Court the power to overturn the factual findings of juries in lower courts. Considered one of the most straightforward amendments in the Bill or Rights, the Seventh ...
The Eighth Amendment continues the theme of the Fifth and Sixth Amendments by targeting potential abuses on the part of the criminal justice system. In banning the requirement of “excessive bail,” the imposition of “excessive fines,” and the infliction of “cruel and unusual punishment,” but leaving the exact interpretation of these terms unclear, i...
During the debate that produced the Bill of Rights, skeptics argued that by listing such fundamental rights in the Constitution, the framers would be implying that the rights they did not list did not exist. Madison sought to allay these fears with the Ninth Amendment. It ensures that even while certain rights are enumerated in the Constitution, pe...
As the final amendment in the Bill of Rights, the 10th Amendment originally aimed to reassure Anti-Federalists by further defining the balance of power between the national government and those of the individual states. According to the 10th Amendment, the federal government’s powers are limited to those expressly given to it by the Constitution, w...
Warren, Charles 1928 The Making of the Constitution. Boston: Little, Brown. Encyclopedia of the American Constitution. CONSTITUTIONAL HISTORY, 1776–1789On July 4, 1776, King George III wrote in his diary, "Nothing of importance this day." When the news of the declaration of independence reached him, he still could not know how wrong he had been.
t. e. The history of the United States from 1776 to 1789 was marked by the nation's transition from the American Revolutionary War to the establishment of a novel constitutional order. As a result of the American Revolution, the thirteen British colonies emerged as a newly independent nation, the United States of America, between 1776 and 1789.
- Influence of Magna Carta. The roots of the Bill of Rights lie deep in Anglo-American history. In 1215 England’s King John, under pressure from rebellious barons, put his seal to Magna Carta, which protected subjects against royal abuses of power.
- Constitutional Convention. Once independence had been declared in 1776, the American states turned immediately to the writing of state constitutions and state bills of rights.
- James Madison Drafts Amendments. James Madison. In the First Congress, Madison undertook to fulfill his promise. Carefully sifting amendments from proposals made in the state ratifying conventions, Madison steered his project through the shoals of indifference on the part of some members (who thought the House had more important work to do) and outright hostility on the part of others (Antifederalists who hoped for a second convention to hobble the powers of the federal government).
- Post-Bill of Rights Amendments. The Civil War and Reconstruction brought, in their wake, the Fourteenth Amendment, which declares, among other things, that no state shall “deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law.”
This page is a list of the amendments to the United States Constitution. Since the Constitution went into effect on March 4, 1789, twenty-seven amendments have been added to the Constitution. This page gives just a short summary of each of these amendments. For more information about each amendment, click on the links in the box at the right of ...
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The Founding Fathers were leaders who played a role in shaping one or more of the three documents that established the United States and its government: the Declaration of Independence (1776), the Articles of Confederation (1781), and the U.S. Constitution (1787). The Founding Fathers at this meeting worked for four months, until September 1787 ...
