ill of Rights to be considered by Congress, he proposed nine amendments to be considered by Congress for insertion into the text of the Constitution. After deliberation, debate, and some alterations, the House and Senate voted to add the amendments on the end of the Constitution and sent twelve amendments to the states for ratification. (1) Only ten of theses were ratified and from those are what we know as the Bill of Rights today. As ratified in 1791, the Bill of Rights protected individual rights from violation by the federal government. For example the First Amendment begins, Congress shall make no law... Madisons original draft had contained a proposal that would have also prohibited state governments from violating the Bill of Rights, but the Senate deleted it. (1)It was not until after the Civil War that the Thirteenth, Fourteenth, and Fifteenth amendments were enacted and began protecting individuals against the states. The Fourteenth Amendment has been the principal means by which this protection has been accomplished. It reads, in part, No State shall...deprive any person of life, liberty, or property without due process of law. The Supreme Court had interpreted this guarantee of liberty to embrace the fundamental liberties in the Bill of Rights, meaning that the state governments must observe and protect them to the same extent as the federal government this is also known called incorporation. The amendments in the Bill of Rights are said to be incorporated against the states through the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. There has been an ongoing debate on the Supreme Court about the extent of incorporation, and whether the entire Bill of Rights, or only some of its guarantees, should be incorporated against the states. (1)Part IIThe Supreme Court views and attitudes can change over time. First the membership of the court changes when a justice retires or dies, and when the new justice is appointed to fill his p...
