The Fourteenth Amendment's ratification generated some controversy for a time, particularly from legal scholars of the South who claimed that the amendment was invalid because of its ratification process.
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 ...
The 14th Amendment granted U.S. citizenship to former slaves and contained three new limits on state power: a state shall not violate a citizen's privileges or immunities; shall not deprive any person of life, liberty, or property without due process of law; and must guarantee all persons equal protection of the laws.
The Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States granted citizenship and equal civil and legal rights to anyone born in the United States or who became a citizen of the country. This included African Americans and slaves who had been freed after the American Civil War.
Overview. The Fourteenth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution contains a number of important concepts, most famously state action, privileges or immunities, citizenship, due process, and equal protection—all of which are contained in Section One.
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 ...
The Fourteenth Amendment only applies to actions by state governments (state actions), not private actions. Consider, for example, Obergefell, which involved the fundamental right to marry. Some state laws interfered with that right. The state law is a government action.
14th Amendment - Citizenship Rights, Equal Protection, Apportionment, Civil War Debt | Constitution Center.
The amendment's first section includes the Citizenship Clause, Privileges or Immunities Clause, Due Process Clause, and Equal Protection Clause. The Citizenship Clause broadly defines citizenship, superseding the Supreme Court's decision in Dred Scott v.
The procedural protections (life, liberty, and property), the entire Bill of Rights (freedom of speech, right to bear arms, legal protection), and the non-enumerated fundamental rights of the citizen were all extended to every American citizen in the United States with the Fourteenth Amendment.