Resources

The centerpiece of the Reconstruction amendments granted citizenship, equality, and due process of the laws to everyone, including formerly enslaved Black Americans.

A collection containing the congressional debates on the 14th Amendment (H.J. Res. 127), as printed in the Congressional Globe.

“An Act to protect all Persons in the United States in their Civil Rights, and furnish the Means of their Vindication.”

“An act to protect all citizens in their civil and legal rights.”

Also known as the Klu Klux Klan Acts, these laws were enacted to enforce the provisions of the Reconstruction amendments and to put and end to white supremacist violence against African Americans.

Report from presidential emissary Carl Schurz to Congress' Joint Committee on Reconstruction (1865).

The findings of the joint congressional committee that, during the 39th Congress, drafted the 14th Amendment.

Report of the committee charged with investigating “the condition of affairs in the late insurrectionary states, so far as regards the execution of laws, and the safety of the lives and property of the citizens of the United States.”

The Supreme Court’s first interpretation of the 14th Amendment offered a constrained view of its “privileges and immunities” clause, setting the stage for decades of state repression and judicial disregard toward Black people.

In a case arising from the 1873 Colfax massacre, during which more than 125 Black people were murdered by white supremacists, the Supreme Court ruled that the 14th Amendment only applied to state action, not to persons acting individually.

In the Civil Rights Cases, the Supreme Court held that the Civil Rights Act of 1875, which regulated discrimination by private individuals, exceeded Congress's authority under the 13th Amendment and the 14th Amendment.

In Plessy v. Ferguson, the Supreme Court ruled that separate-but-equal facilities did not violate the 14th Amendment's guarantee of equal protection of the laws.

In United States v. Classic, the Supreme Court declined to extend the 14th Amendment's equality guarantee to a criminal scheme that resulted in many Louisiana voters not having their ballots counted.

In Shelley v. Kramer, the Supreme decided that state courts are prohibited by the 14th Amendment from enforcing racially restrictive covenants in housing deeds.

In Sweatt v. Painter, the Supreme Court decided that the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment required the admission of a Black law student to the University of Texas Law School.

In this milestone, the Supreme Court ruled that separating children in public schools on the basis of race was unconstitutional under the 14th Amendment, overruling the “separate but equal” principle of Plessy v. Ferguson.

In Cooper v. Aaron, the Supreme Court made clear that its interpretation of the 14th Amendment announced in the Brown v. Board of Education case is the supreme law of the land—and binding on the states.

In Mapp v. Ohio, the Supreme Court held that the protections against unreasonable searches and seizures of the Fourth Amendment apply to the states via the Due Process Clause of the 14th Amendment.

In this follow-on to Cooper v. Aaron (1958), the Supreme Court held that “deliberate speed . . . can no longer justify denying these Prince Edward County school children their constitutional rights to an education” in Virginia.

In Palmer v. Thompson, the Supreme Court held that the closing of public swimming pools in Jackson, Mississippi, to avoid desegregation did not violate the 14th Amendment’s Equal Protection Clause.

A digital index of analysis and interpretation by the Congressional Research Service, along with in-text annotations of cases decided by the Supreme Court of the United States.

A guide providing access to digital collections, websites, and print materials related to the amendment.

Resource page with analysis, interpretation, debate, and other materials related to the 14th Amendment

A brief filed by the founding director of the 14th Amendment Center for Law and Democracy and the faculty director of Charles Hamilton Houston Institute for Race & Justice, in support of respondents in Trump v. Barbara (2026).

Brief filed by the founding director of the 14th Amendment Center for Law and Democracy in support of respondents in Trump v. Anderson, which held that only Congress could enforce Section 3 of the 14th Amendment against candidates for federal office.

A cartoonist’s depiction of President Andrew Johnson’s reluctance to push for recognition, in 1866, of the newly conceived 14th Amendment.

E.W. Kemble’s editorial cartoon, published in 1902, shows Congress’s historical failure to enforce Section 2 of the 14th Amendment, which provides for remedial measures against states that disenfranchise Black voters.

A Thomas Nast cartoon in Harper’s Weekly showing Andrew Johnson as the deceitful Iago who betrayed Othello, portrayed here as an African American Civil War veteran. Includes several scenes of white terror, including a slave auction.

The first session in this series explores the many historical voices and experiences that shaped the struggle for citizenship and equality.

The second session in this series explores how the experiences of Asian Americans helped shape our understanding of birthright citizenship.

An event co-hosted by Vision & Justice and the 14th Amendment Center for Law & Democracy, and co-organized by Sarah Lewis and Sherrilyn Ifill.

“I believe it is planting time. It doesn’t mean we don’t fight, it means we fight and we plant. Who knows what the harvest will yield when it springs forth.”

All five sessions from the 14th Amendment Center’s launch and 2025 symposium, plus a keynote conversation with Ava DuVernay and Sherrilyn Ifill.