Quote:
Originally Posted by Jeff OTMG
The 14th was passed in 1868 and was the result of some of the enumerated rights be stepped on. IMO the states could not void rights under the Constitution, but it took the 14th Amendment to make it official. I think that the 10th Amendment should have been recognized to identify the rights of 'the people', and the rest were for the states. The 14th was a restatement.
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History and the Supreme Court disagree with you.
The Fourteenth Amendment was passed in the aftermath of the Civil War, emancipation and the actions of some states that sought to blunt the effects of emancipation, and the
Dred Scott decision.
Prior to ratification of the Fourteenth Amendment, the Supreme Court specifically held that the Bill of Rights did not apply to the states. The drafters of the amendment believed that the amendment was necessary not to confirm what was already the law, but to change the law and impose on the states the obligation to respect the rights enumerated in the Bill of Rights.
It wasn't until 1920 that SCOTUS first held that the First Amendment applied to the states. Prior to 2010, SCOTUS had held on more than one occasion that the Second Amendment did not apply to states. There are a few rights enumerated in the Bill of Rights, such as the right to trial by jury, that still-valid SCOTUS decisions hold do not apply to the states. As far as that goes, the same 2010 case that held that the Second Amendment does apply to the states,
McDonald v Chicago, specifically notes which rights in the Bill of Rights are not incorporated against the states by the Fourteenth Amendment. The Court also said very clearly, "The Bill of Rights, including the Second Amendment, originally applied only to the Federal Government."