Fourteenth Amendment Overview

Question 1

Four Clauses

Answer 1

(1) Citizenship Clause:
A. All persons, born or naturalized and subject to the jurisdiction of the US are citizens of the United States and the state in which that person resides.
B. Slaughter-House Cases (1873) – Supreme Court declares that this clause overturns Dred Scott and at the same time recognizes a difference between US and State citizenship.

(2) The Privileges or Immunities Clause:
A. Guarantees that states will not abridge the Privileges OR Immunities of US citizens.
B. Slaughter-House Cases – Supreme Court limits the Privileges or Immunities that receive protection against state abridgment to those that are traceable uniquely to citizenship of the federal/national government (and not P/I of state citizenship).

(3) Due Process Clause:
A. No State shall deprive any person of life, liberty, or property without due process of law.
B. This becomes the clause that the Supreme Court will use to do the heavy lifting in its Constitutional Rights jurisprudence.

(4) Equal Protection Clause:
A. No state shall deny to any person the equal protection of the laws.
B. Slaughter-House Cases – “We doubt very much whether any action of a State not directed by way of discrimination against negroes as a class, or on account of their race, will ever be held to come within the purview of this provision.”