Profiling is also a form of prejudice, that is, judging a person by exterior characteristics rather than indisputable facts. The Fourteenth Amendment requires that all citizens be treated equally under the law.
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 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.
The operation of the Fourteenth Amendment is designed to bar state-practiced and operated racial discriminated against African Americans. Here, it is stated that racial profiling as a practice violates the tenets of the Fourteenth Amendment both in its essence and in its text.
Racial profiling is an affront to the core values and principles in the Constitution because it violates civil liberties, equality, and fairness.
The 14th Amendment revoked the Black Codes by declaring that states could not pass laws that denied citizens their constitutional rights and freedoms. No person could be deprived of life, liberty, or property without due process (fair treatment by the judicial system), and the law was to be equally applied to everyone.
What is racial profiling? A generally accepted definition is using racial characteristics in determining whether a person is considered likely to commit a crime or an illegal act or to behave in a certain manner. Profiling violates the Fourth and Fourteenth Amendments.
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.
A major provision of the 14th Amendment was to grant citizenship to “All persons born or naturalized in the United States,” thereby granting citizenship to formerly enslaved people.
The law stated that everyone born in the United States, including former slaves, was an American citizen. No state could pass a law that took away their rights to “life, liberty, or property.” The Fourteenth Amendment also added the first mention of gender into the Constitution.