Also known as: bills of rights · U.S. Bill of Rights · first ten amendments
Written by attorneys — see sources below.
The first ten amendments to the United States Constitution that enumerate specific protections for individual liberties against federal governmental power. Most of these protections apply to state and local governments through selective incorporation under the Fourteenth Amendment Due Process Clause.
Bernard Bass and his wife visit a pharmacy seeking contraceptives for use within their marriage. State officials enforce a law banning such sales to married couples on grounds of marital stability. The couple sues, claiming the law intrudes on a protected zone of privacy. The court applies heightened scrutiny and invalidates the restriction.
Brenda Booth keeps a handgun in her residence for self-defense. A city ordinance prohibits all firearms in homes containing certain manufacturing equipment. She sues the city after citation. The court holds that the incorporated Second Amendment right binds the locality and strikes down the ban.
Barbara Bennett's apartment is searched without a warrant by federal narcotics agents. She files a damages action directly under the Fourth Amendment. The court recognizes an implied cause of action to vindicate the constitutional interest.
On the morning of November 26, 1965, agents of the Federal Bureau of Narcotics entered Webster Bivens's apartment in the Bronx. The agents broke open the door, handcuffed Bivens in front of his wife and young children, and thoroughly searched the apartment. They then transported Bivens to the federal courthouse in Brooklyn, where he was interrogated, booked, and subjected to a visual strip search. Several days later Bivens was released on his own recognizance, and he was never indicted or prosecuted for any offense. Bivens filed suit in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of New York against the six agents in their individual capacities. His complaint sought fifteen thousand dollars in damages from each agent and alleged that the arrest and search were effected without a warrant, that unreasonable force was employed, and that the arrest was made without probable cause. Bivens claimed to have suffered great humiliation, embarrassment, and mental suffering as a result of the agents' conduct. The District Court dismissed the complaint on the ground that it failed to state a cause of action. The United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit affirmed the dismissal. The Supreme Court of the United States granted certiorari to review the judgment.
View caseBobby Brady is charged in juvenile court with an act that would be a crime if committed by an adult. The prosecution seeks to prove the charge by a preponderance of the evidence. The court requires proof beyond a reasonable doubt to satisfy due process.
During a 1967 adjudicatory hearing conducted pursuant to section 742 of the New York Family Court Act, a judge in New York Family Court found that the twelve-year-old appellant had entered a locker and stolen one hundred twelve dollars from a woman's pocketbook. The petition which charged appellant with delinquency alleged that his act, if done by an adult, would constitute the crime or crimes of larceny. The judge acknowledged that the proof might not establish guilt beyond a reasonable doubt but relied on section 744(b) of the New York Family Court Act, which provides that any determination at the conclusion of an adjudicatory hearing that a juvenile did an act or acts must be based on a preponderance of the evidence. After a subsequent dispositional hearing, appellant was ordered placed in a training school for an initial period of eighteen months, subject to annual extensions of his commitment until his eighteenth birthday, six years in appellant's case. The Appellate Division of the New York Supreme Court, First Judicial Department, affirmed without opinion. The New York Court of Appeals then affirmed by a four-to-three vote, expressly sustaining the constitutionality of section 744(b). The Supreme Court noted probable jurisdiction.
View caseBlake Butler and his partner apply for a marriage license in a state that limits marriage to opposite-sex couples. They sue after denial. The court recognizes a fundamental liberty interest in marriage protected by the Due Process Clause.
The petitioners were fourteen same-sex couples and two men whose same-sex partners were deceased. They lived in Michigan, Kentucky, Ohio, and Tennessee. Those states defined marriage as a union between one man and one woman under their constitutions and statutes. The petitioners filed suits in federal district courts in their home states. They sought marriage licenses or recognition of marriages lawfully performed elsewhere. James Obergefell and John Arthur traveled from Ohio to Maryland to marry aboard a medical transport plane because Arthur suffered from ALS; Obergefell later sought to be listed as surviving spouse on Arthur's death certificate. April DeBoer and Jayne Rowse, Michigan nurses, adopted three children but could not both serve as legal parents under state adoption rules. Army Reserve Sergeant Ijpe DeKoe and Thomas Kostura married in New York before DeKoe's deployment to Afghanistan and later settled in Tennessee. Each district court ruled in the petitioners' favor. The respondents appealed. The Sixth Circuit consolidated the cases and reversed the district court judgments. The petitioners sought certiorari, which the Supreme Court granted. Same-sex couples had begun establishing families after substantial cultural and political developments in the late twentieth century. Earlier litigation had addressed the legal status of gays and lesbians, including challenges that reached the Supreme Court in Bowers v. Hardwick and Lawrence v. Texas.
View caseBianca Blanco lives with her grandson in a single-family zone that restricts households to nuclear families. City officials issue a citation and seek eviction. The court holds that the zoning ordinance impermissibly burdens protected family interests.
In early 1973, Mrs. Inez Moore received a notice of violation from the city of East Cleveland. The notice stated that her grandson John Moore, Jr., was an illegal occupant of her home. It directed her to comply with the housing ordinance. Mrs. Moore lived in her East Cleveland home together with her son Dale Moore, Sr., and her two grandsons Dale Moore, Jr., and John Moore, Jr. John came to live with her after his mother's death when he was less than one year old. When she failed to remove John from the home, the city filed a criminal charge against her. Mrs. Moore moved to dismiss the charge. She claimed that the ordinance was constitutionally invalid on its face. Her motion was overruled. Upon conviction she was sentenced to five days in jail and a $25 fine. The East Cleveland ordinance limited occupancy of a dwelling unit to members of a single family. The ordinance defined family to include only a husband or wife of the nominal head of the household, unmarried children of the head or spouse provided they have no children residing with them, a parent of the head or spouse, or not more than one dependent child of the head or spouse along with that child's spouse and dependent children. The Ohio Court of Appeals affirmed the conviction after giving full consideration to her constitutional claims. The Ohio Supreme Court denied review of the case. The United States Supreme Court noted probable jurisdiction of her appeal.
View caseThe Bill of Rights originally limited only the federal government. Through selective incorporation under the Fourteenth Amendment Due Process Clause, most of its protections now apply to the states as well.
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The right arises from penumbras of several Bill of Rights guarantees, including the First, Third, Fourth, Fifth, and Ninth Amendments. State laws that directly interfere with married couples' intimate decisions about contraception are subject to heightened scrutiny.
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The Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms for self-defense in the home is incorporated against the states and their political subdivisions through the Fourteenth Amendment. Municipal ordinances that burden this core right are subject to constitutional challenge.
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Several amendments impose direct limits on the criminal process, including protections against unreasonable searches, compelled self-incrimination, and cruel and unusual punishment. These guarantees apply to federal proceedings by their terms and to state proceedings through incorporation.
…the Fourteenth Amendment's Due Process Clause; or in personal, marital, familial, and sexual privacy said to be protected by the Bill of Rights or its penumbras, see Griswold v. Connecticut , 381 U.S. 479 (1965); Eisenstadt v. Baird , 405 U.S. 438 (1972); or among those rights reserved to the people by the Ninth Amendment,…