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Course: Constitution 101 Sandbox > Unit 5
Lesson 7: 7.7: Reconstruction: The Fourteenth Amendment- Primary Source: Text of the Fourteenth Amendment
- Scholars Edition: Eric Foner, 14th Amendment
- Scholars Edition: Tomiko Brown Nagin, 14th Amendment
- Info Brief: The Fourteenth Amendment—Framing, Ratification, and Principles
- Why did the Reconstruction Republicans push for the 14th Amendment?
- The 39th Congress Debates: A Clip From FOURTEEN
- Interactive: Drafting Table—The Fourteenth Amendment
- Who was John Bingham?
- Primary Source: Thaddeus Stevens, Speech Introducing the Fourteenth Amendment (1866)
- Primary Source: Jacob Howard, Speech Introducing the Fourteenth Amendment to the Senate (1866)
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Interactive: Drafting Table—The Fourteenth Amendment
Google ClassroomExplore the National Constitution Center’s interactive drafting table on the Fourteenth Amendment to discover how the Reconstruction generation framed and ratified this transformational amendment that wrote the Declaration of Independence’s promise of freedom and equality into the Constitution.
Explore the National Constitution Center’s interactive drafting table on the Fourteenth Amendment to discover how the Reconstruction generation framed and ratified this transformational amendment that wrote the Declaration of Independence’s promise of freedom and equality into the Constitution. The Fourteenth Amendment represented the second of three constitutional promises that the Reconstruction generation made to establish a multiracial democracy.
Click on different provisions of the amendment and scroll through the timeline to see how the various provisions changed over time. Click on the supplemental documents and people to read further descriptions of the vital moments and characters in the drafting and ratification story.
Guiding Questions:
- Click through each of the tabs—“Citizenship,” “Privileges or Immunities,” “Due Process,” “Equal Protection,” “Representation,” “Ex-Confederate Rights,” “War Debt,” and “Enforcement of 14th”—and read the background text for each one.
- Click on the “Equal Protection” tab and read through the various drafts proposed over time.
- What language or phrasing was constant? What changed?
- Who were some of the main characters involved in the drafting story?
- What threats and wrongs were the Reconstruction drafters concerned with?
- Scroll along the timeline at the bottom of the page. How did broader events shape the framing and ratification history of the Fourteenth Amendment?