US Bill of Rights (1789): The First Ten Amendments Explained

The United States Bill of Rights is the collective name for the first ten amendments to the US Constitution. James Madison introduced them in the House of Representatives on 8 June 1789, Congress approved a list of twelve amendments that September, and ten were ratified by the states on 15 December 1791. They guarantee freedoms of religion, speech and the press, protect people accused of crimes and limit the powers of the federal government.

Background: a constitution without a bill of rights

The Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia produced a plan of government but no list of individual rights. When George Mason of Virginia proposed one in the final days, the delegates rejected the idea, arguing that the state constitutions already protected such rights. Mason refused to sign the Constitution, in part for this reason.

Most states had their own declarations of rights, the most influential being Mason’s Virginia Declaration of Rights of June 1776. Opponents of the Constitution, known as Anti-Federalists, warned that a powerful national government with no written limits could suppress the press, abolish jury trials or establish a church. The demand for a bill of rights became their most popular argument.

Federalists replied that a federal government of limited, listed powers needed no such guarantees. In The Federalist No. 84, Alexander Hamilton even argued that a bill of rights might be dangerous, since listing some rights could suggest that others were unprotected. Nevertheless, Massachusetts, Virginia, New York and other states ratified only while recommending amendments, more than two hundred in total, many of them overlapping.

Madison changes his mind

James Madison, the leading architect of the Constitution, at first regarded a bill of rights as unnecessary, calling such declarations “parchment barriers” that majorities would ignore. He came to see amendments differently for several reasons. They could calm the fears of moderate opponents, head off demands for a second convention that might undo the Constitution, and protect liberties he valued, especially freedom of religion.

Politics also played a part. Anti-Federalists in Virginia kept Madison out of the Senate, and he faced James Monroe in a contest for a House seat. In letters to voters he promised to work for amendments protecting essential rights, and he won the election in February 1789. His correspondence with Thomas Jefferson, then in Paris, also encouraged him; Jefferson had argued that a bill of rights was what the people were entitled to against every government.

The debate in Congress

On 8 June 1789 Madison introduced his proposals in the House, which was meeting at Federal Hall in New York. Many members thought there were more urgent matters, such as raising revenue and organising the executive departments, and the debate was delayed until August.

Madison had wanted to weave the changes into the body of the Constitution. Roger Sherman of Connecticut and others insisted that they be added at the end as separate amendments, and that approach was adopted. On 24 August the House approved seventeen amendments. The Senate, meeting behind closed doors, combined and trimmed them to twelve and struck out a proposal Madison considered among the most important, which would have stopped the states from violating freedom of conscience, freedom of the press or trial by jury.

A conference committee settled the final wording, and Congress approved twelve amendments on 25 September 1789. President George Washington sent copies to the states, and a parchment copy is preserved today at the National Archives in Washington, DC.

Ratification

New Jersey was the first state to ratify, in November 1789. Approval by three-quarters of the states was required, and the admission of Vermont in March 1791 raised the number of states to fourteen, so eleven were needed. Virginia, where Anti-Federalists had argued that the amendments did not go far enough, ratified on 15 December 1791, completing the process for ten of them.

Massachusetts, Connecticut and Georgia did not formally ratify until 1939, the 150th anniversary of the amendments’ proposal, a symbolic gesture. Of the two amendments left over, one on the apportionment of the House has never been ratified. The other, on congressional pay, was approved by enough states in 1992 to become the Twenty-seventh Amendment.

What the ten amendments say

The First Amendment bars Congress from establishing a religion or restricting its free exercise, and protects freedom of speech, the press, peaceable assembly and petition. The Second protects the right to keep and bear arms in connection with a well-regulated militia, a provision whose meaning remains disputed. The Third restricts the quartering of soldiers in private homes.

The Fourth through Eighth Amendments concern justice. They forbid unreasonable searches and seizures, protect against double jeopardy and self-incrimination, require due process of law, guarantee a speedy public trial by jury and the help of a lawyer, preserve jury trial in many civil cases, and ban excessive bail and cruel and unusual punishments.

The Ninth declares that listing certain rights does not deny others retained by the people, answering Hamilton’s objection. The Tenth reserves powers not delegated to the federal government to the states or the people.

Later significance

At first the Bill of Rights was rarely tested in court. Within a decade, critics of the Alien and Sedition Acts of 1798 invoked the First Amendment against the federal government’s prosecution of newspaper editors. In Barron v. Baltimore (1833) the Supreme Court ruled that the amendments limited only the federal government.

The Fourteenth Amendment, adopted in 1868, forbade states to deprive anyone of liberty without due process of law. From the 1920s onward the Supreme Court used it to apply most protections of the Bill of Rights to the states, a process known as incorporation. Today the amendments are central to American law and public life.

Myths and facts

Myth: the Bill of Rights was part of the original Constitution. It was added later. The Constitution was signed in 1787 and took effect in 1789 without any amendments, and the ten amendments became law only in December 1791.

Myth: the Bill of Rights originally protected everyone against all governments. It limited only the federal government until the Fourteenth Amendment, and its promises did not extend to enslaved people, who were denied almost all legal rights. Women and many free Black Americans were also excluded from voting and from jury service in most states.

Fact: Madison proposed more than he achieved. His original draft included a statement that all power derives from the people and limits on state governments as well as federal ones. Congress dropped these, keeping the amendments focused on restraining the national government.

Fact: the phrase “Bill of Rights” was not official. Congress described the twelve proposals simply as articles in addition to and amendment of the Constitution. The familiar name, echoing the English Bill of Rights of 1689 and the state declarations of rights, was attached to the first ten amendments by common usage rather than by law.

Timeline

• 1776, 12 June: Virginia adopts George Mason’s Declaration of Rights.
• 1787, 12 September: The Philadelphia Convention rejects Mason’s proposal for a bill of rights.
• 1789, 8 June: Madison introduces his amendments in the House of Representatives.
• 1789, 24 August: The House approves seventeen amendments.
• 1789, 25 September: Congress approves twelve amendments and sends them to the states.
• 1789, 20 November: New Jersey becomes the first state to ratify.
• 1791, 15 December: Virginia’s ratification makes ten amendments part of the Constitution.
• 1992, 7 May: The congressional pay amendment is ratified as the Twenty-seventh Amendment.

Why it matters

The Bill of Rights turned the political promises of the ratification debate into enforceable law. It made the protection of individual liberty a permanent part of the American constitutional system and has influenced charters of rights in many other countries.