The Fourteenth Amendment (the second of the Reconstruction Amendments) defines who is a US citizen and grants rights to people living in the US, regardless of citizenship status. It also authorizes the federal government to intervene when state governments violate or limit people’s constitutional rights, and deals with how to apportion representatives in the House of Representatives in the wake of emancipation. Congress passed the Fourteenth Amendment on June 13, 1866. It was ratified on July 9, 1868, and we’re still debating how it should modify the Constitution.
Amendment XIV
Section 1.
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 any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.
Section 2.
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.
Section 3.
No person shall be a Senator or Representative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice-President, or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any State, who, having previously taken an oath, as a member of Congress, or as an officer of the United States, or as a member of any State legislature, or as an executive or judicial officer of any State, to support the Constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof. But Congress may by a vote of two-thirds of each House, remove such disability.
Section 4.
The validity of the public debt of the United States, authorized by law, including debts incurred for payment of pensions and bounties for services in suppressing insurrection or rebellion, shall not be questioned. But neither the United States nor any State shall assume or pay any debt or obligation incurred in aid of insurrection or rebellion against the United States, or any claim for the loss or emancipation of any slave; but all such debts, obligations and claims shall be held illegal and void.
Section 5.
The Congress shall have power to enforce, by appropriate legislation, the provisions of this article.
Section 1, known as the Citizenship Clause, establishes the rights and benefits of US citizenship, including what is referred to as “birthright citizenship,” which means that anyone born on United States soil is a citizen of the US, regardless of the parents’ citizenship status. This section also entitles naturalized citizens to the same rights and protections as US citizens. A naturalized citizen is a foreign-born person who completes the formal legal process of becoming a US citizen.
The Due Process Clause prevents states from depriving citizens of their rights and requires a fair legal process before denying individuals life, liberty, or property, guaranteeing equal protection under the law to everyone.
The Equal protection Clause bans states and local governments from denying individuals “equal protection of the laws,” a guarantee that applies to anybody within the jurisdiction of the state or locality.
Section 2 of the Fourteenth Amendment modified Article I, Section 2 of the Constitution, changing how states apportion seats in the House of Representatives. It repealed the old three-fifths rule, which counted enslaved people as three-fifths of a person when determining how many House seats a state would get (the number of representatives in each state is based on the size of its population). This section made it so all people were counted as whole persons. It also explicitly provides that no state can deny male citizens over the age of 21 the right to vote; this was superseded by section 1 of the 26th Amendment.
Section 3 applies to anyone who has sworn an oath to uphold the Constitution, and bans them from holding federal or state public office if they engage in “insurrection or rebellion.” Congress can lift this ban but only with a two-thirds vote in both houses.
Section 4 established the validity of the United States legal debts. At the same time, this part disclaims ongoing government responsibility for debts incurred by the Confederacy. It also prescribes that the government would not pay slaveholders for the financial loss of people who had been enslaved and then freed.
Section 5 gives Congress the power to pass laws to enforce all the other parts of the amendment. It is known as the Enforcement Clause.
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