What is the Bill of Rights?

IN THE DAYS AFTER the United States won its independence from Britain in the 1780s, people vigorously debated how much power a government needed to rule, and how best to protect people’s rights from being overly stifled by the government. The now-famous Federalist and Anti-Federalist papers were originally published as letters in newspapers, and instead of using their given names, the letter writers often took names like “Brutus,” “Agrippa,” and “Cato”—well-known figures from the era of the Roman Republic. In their struggle to create a free society, after having only known life under a king, the early Americans looked to ancient Roman society for inspiration.

The first ten amendments to the Constitution, called the Bill of Rights, were the answer to the power of government versus personal freedom debate. The amendments form our basic sense of what it means to be American. These are the laws that now protect our freedom of religion and speech, our independent press, and our right to assemble peacefully in protest. Among other things, the Bill of Rights establishes our right to bear arms (not arm bears) and to be granted fair and speedy trials, and protects us from cruel and unusual punishment.

The Preamble to the Bill of Rights

Congress of the United States begun and held at the City of New-York, on Wednesday the fourth of March, one thousand seven hundred and eighty nine.

The Conventions of a number of the States having, at the time of adopting the Constitution, expressed a desire, in order to prevent misconstruction or abuse of its powers, that further declaratory and restrictive clauses should be added, and as extending the ground of public confidence in the Government will best insure the beneficent ends of its institution;

Resolved, by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America, in Congress assembled, two-thirds of both Houses concurring, that the following articles be proposed to the Legislatures of the several States, as amendments to the Constitution of the United States; all or any of which articles, when ratified by three-fourths of the said Legislatures, to be valid to all intents and purposes as part of the said Constitution, namely:

Ratified December 15, 1791

Seventeen amendments follow these. The last, ratified in 1992, made it harder for our Senators and Representatives to raise their own salaries. This amendment has a long and intriguing history; it was first submitted in 1779 as part of a heated debate about states rights! Amendments are first passed by a two-thirds majority of the full Congress—the Senate and the House of Representatives. Then they must be approved, or ratified, by the legislatures of seventy-five percent of the states. This often means years of spirited discussion for each attempt to pass a new amendment.

The history of the amendments highlights our nation’s most impassioned debates. In 1868, the thirteenth amendment abolished slavery. Two years later, the fifteenth guaranteed that our right to vote could not be denied on account of our race, color, or having previously been a slave. The eighteenth amendment made it illegal to manufacture alcohol—and ushered in the prohibition years (which ended two years later, when the amendment was repealed).

In 1920, the nineteenth amendment marked a significant event for girls and women in America when, after 141 years of male-only elections, women were granted the right to vote. Just afterward, Alice Paul, one of the suffragettes, or activists on behalf of women’s voting, or suffrage, presented to Congress an amendment to supply equal rights to women. It wasn’t until the 1970s, however, that both houses of Congress sent this amendment to the states to ratify. Although the Equal Rights Amendment came close to approval by thirty-eight of our fifty states, the necessary three-quarters, it was defeated.