Fourteenth Amendment To Celebrate The Bill Of Rights To The States

The originally Bill of Rights protected the rights of citizens from infringement by the federal government, but made no mention of the states. The Fourteen Amendment, adopted shortly after the Civil War, protected citizenship and individual rights from infringement by state governments. Under the Fourteenth Amendment’s due process clause, the United States Supreme Court began to apply the most important rights guaranteed in the Bill of Rights against the states. This process began in the early 1900s and is known as the doctrine of selective incorporation. Duncan versus Louisiana was the landmark case in which the court incorporated the Sixth Amendment right to a jury trial against the states.

The Due Process Clause was interpreted differently by various Justices in the Court who were using different theories for understanding the Constitution. There are three major theories for Constitutional interpretation. The first is textualism, which is the theory that the “ordinary meaning” of a law should be used for its interpretation, rather than the reason it was written or the problem it was meant to solve. The second is originalism, which says that the interpretation of a law should be decided based on the original meaning or purpose the law had when it was written. The third is literalism, which is rather self explanatory and, as the name implies, means interpeting the text of a law as literally as possible. I

Due Process found in the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments is a cardinal proposition in the United States Constitution. Not only does it aim to restrict the power of federal and state governments, but it also provides adequate protection to all citizens. Chiefly influenced by a British Philosopher, John Locke, the Due Process Clause emphasizes the importance of “life, liberty, and property”. More specifically, any deprivation of the three freedoms can occur only through judicial and procedural safeguards (Smentkowski). First documented in the Magna Carta, the concept of legality became a constitutional guarantee that affords equal protection of the laws (Strauss). In fact, the Due Process Clause of the Fifth Amendment guarantees the fundamental rights of defendants and reinforces fairness in any legal procedure. Without Due Process, the less privileged would not have the right to legal counsel nor to remain silent during interrogation sessions. Due Process in the Fifth Amendment seeks to secure the rights of all citizens regardless of their age, background, or social status.

Selective Incorporation is basically a concept of taking specific parts of the Bill of Right and apply them to the States and local government, on a case by case basis. And That was after the Civil War (1868), when the 14th amendment was past and it has in it two famous clauses which are the ‘due process clause” in which the states can’t be working by a different standard then the National Congress, and the equal protection clause which people have to be protected equally from the Congress and the States government.

Congress and Abraham Lincoln were able to pass the 13th Amendment, but shortly after the end of the war Abraham Lincoln was shot while attending a play at a theater. After Abraham Lincoln passed away Congress had a more difficult time under Andrew Johnson who tried to veto a Republican bill. Congress retaliated by voting to impeach the Andrew Johnson. Afterward Congress was able to pass the 14th and 15th Amendments. The 13th, 14th and 15th Amendments changed the United States by increasing the federal government’s power over the States and this had an affect across society.

In the book, selective incorporation is defined as the, “Process of applying some of the rights in the Bill of Rights to the states to the states through the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment (Losco 65).” In other words, selective incorporation is a doctrine that protects the rights, privileges and immunities of the citizens in the United States from state laws. It was created because of the complex debate that comes in the heart of the Constitution itself. A major issue since the beginning of the government was the relationship between the individual states and the national government, and was a heated debate at the Philadelphia convention which produced the Constitution. Additionally, as we learned earlier in history classes

The court decision on Roe Vs Wade violated the due process clause of 14th amendment. The 14th Amendment says that no states are allowed to take away the privacy rights of its citizens. The court said that the taxes law violated the due process clause of the 14th amendment.

It was not until after the Civil War that the Thirteenth, Fourteenth, and Fifteenth amendments were enacted and began protecting individuals against the states. The Fourteenth Amendment has been the principal means by which this protection has been accomplished. It reads, in part, “No State shall...deprive any person of life, liberty, or property without due process of law.” The Supreme Court had interpreted this guarantee of liberty to embrace the fundamental liberties in the Bill of Rights, meaning that the state governments must observe and protect them to the same extent as the federal government this is also known called incorporation. The amendments in the Bill of Rights are said to be incorporated against the states through the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. There has been an ongoing debate on the Supreme Court about the extent of incorporation, and whether the entire Bill of Rights, or only some of it’s guarantees, should be incorporated against the states.

The concept of selective incorporation has played a huge role over the debate of the powers of a state or local government against the federal government. According to Tom Streissguth, "... it refers to how the rights outlined in the Constitution apply to the states -- and the requirement that state laws and constitutions must observe these rights" in his article "The Definition of Selective Incorporation" (Streissguth). After the Civil War, the idea of selective incorporation came with the passing of the Fourteenth Amendment. The legislature laid down significant new rights for the citizens of the United States; these rights included due process and equal protection. This amendment also touched upon and strengthened the first ten amendments to the Constitution known as the Bill of Rights.

The Thirteenth, Fourteenth, and Fifteenth Amendments are a really big part of the Constitution for slavery and about the equal rights in the United States. The government created the thirteenth, fourteenth, and fifteenth amendment to allow racial equality in the United States by freeing all of the slaves, giving them the right to get citizenship, and the right to vote. I will be talking about each Amendment and how they were formed and also why.

Ever since the Bill of Rights was first written and published it had been established as the supreme law of the land. Certain amendments in the Bill of Rights have been incorporated and these include the First Amendment, parts of the Fifth Amendment, and also the Fourth Amendment. Selective incorporation helps to strengthen this idea by not allowing states to pass a law which takes away the rights that are published within the Bill of Rights. Although this has not been made an actual law, it is a belief that has been fortified over the years by rulings in the United States Supreme Court. Selective incorporation helps to protect citizens’ rights that are included in the Bill of Rights. It protects them from states imposing laws that would take

Selective incorporation is a constitutional doctrine that guarantees states cannot enact laws that take away the constitutional rights of american citizens that are preserve in the Bill of Rights. Selective incorporation is mainly about the ability of the federal government to limit the states’ lawmaking power. this is largely a result of the “due Process” clause where it has been regards to guarantee the individual rights. Ranging from economic liberty to criminal

Selective incorporation has also been used to increase the power of the federal government. Selective incorporation is that most but not all of the protections within the bill of rights apply to the states due to the fourteenth amendment. Though this gives certain rights to the states, federal courts can still overturn the practices of the states. C) Block grants are federal grants which are given automatically to the states in order to support broad programs as the development of the community or social security.

My favorite case we went over in constitutional law this year is Lochner v. New York because of the display of power by the justices joined in the majority and the fervent dissent countering their reasoning. I have described Lochner above in the context of the Commerce clause above but my focus for this question is the case in context of the Substantive due process section of the class. The substantive due process clause deals with the law itself and not the process, substantive rights are protected under the Due Process Clause. This clause has come to encompass more and more rights, such as abortion, the right to die, and many other. “No state shall deprive any person of life, liberty or property, without due process of law” (U.S. Const.

The Due Process Clause is both the 5th Amendment and 14th Amendment that restricts governmental actions. The 5th Amendment restricts only national government and the 14th Amendment restricts only state governments. The due process involves two dimensions which are procedural due process and substantive due process.