The 14th Amendment Turns 150 Today, but Its Legacy in Supreme Court Rulings is Now Uncertain

"President Donald Trump is set to announce his Supreme Court nominee Monday — and whomever he chooses will play a major role in deciding how an 150-year old pillar of the Constitution will be upheld.

In addition to Trump’s consequential announcement, Monday marks the 150th anniversary of the ratification of the 14th Amendment, which has been responsible for reshaping the face of civil rights in America through such key rulings as Brown v. Board of Education, Roe v. Wade and Obergefell v. Hodges.

With Trump’s conservative Supreme Court pick capable of changing the court’s makeup, however, the future of this 150-year-old amendment may hang in the balance.

What is the 14th Amendment?
Ratified on July 9, 1868, the 14th Amendment granted citizenship to “all persons born or naturalized in the United States” and held that no state could make or enforce a law that violated a citizen’s “privileges or immunities.”

“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,” it reads.

The amendment, passed in the wake of the Civil War, was aimed at conferring citizenship and its associated rights to African-Americans. It also protected individual rights from state interference, as postbellum Confederate states sought to restrict African-Americans’ rights to property, free speech and more..."

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