14th Amendment PowerPoint

14TH AMENDMENT … No state shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of the citizens of the United States; 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 of the equal protection of the laws.

EQUAL PROTECTION UNDER THE LAW •

The right of all persons to have the same access to the law and courts, and to be treated equally by the law and courts, both in procedures and in the substance of the law.

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The most famous case on the subject is Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka (1954) in which Chief Justice Earl Warren, for a unanimous Supreme Court, ruled that "separate but equal" educational facilities for blacks was inherently unequal and unconstitutional since the segregated school system did not give all students equal rights under the law.

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It will also apply to other inequalities such as differentials in pay for the same work or unequal taxation. The principle is stated in the 14th Amendment to the Constitution: "No State shall deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws."

LOVING V. VIRGINIA

LOVING V. VIRGINIA (1967) • In 1958, it was a crime in Virginia and 15 other states for a white person to marry a black person.

• Richard and Mildred Loving married in Washington, D.C. and tried to return to their home state of Virginia. • They were arrested and sentenced to 1 year in jail for getting married if they stayed in Virginia. The ACLU took their case. • In 1967, the Supreme Court unanimously ruled the law was unconstitutional

EDIE & THEA

WINDSOR V. UNITED STATES (2013) •

Edie Windsor was forced to pay almost $400,000 in federal estate taxes when her beloved spouse, Thea Spyer, died in 2009. They’d been together for 44 years, and were legally married. If “Thea” had been “Theo,” Edie would not have had to pay any estate taxes.

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Edie challenged the “Defense of Marriage Act” that caused this disparity. Passed by Congress in 1996, DOMA treated the marriages of straight people one way and the marriages of gay people another way. Edie thought this was discrimination that the U.S. government could not justify.

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In a historic civil rights ruling this June, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that DOMA was unconstitutional, and that the federal government cannot discriminate against married lesbian and gay couples in determining federal benefits and protections.

NYPD’S STOP & FRISK PROGRAM

NYPD’S STOP & FRISK PROGRAM •

New Yorkers have been subjected to police stops and street interrogations more than 4 million times since 2002, and that black and Latino communities continue to be the overwhelming target of these tactics. Nearly nine out of 10 stopped-and-frisked New Yorkers have been completely innocent.

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In 2012, New Yorkers were stopped by the police 532,911 times 473,644 were totally innocent (89 percent) 284,229 were black (55 percent) 165,140 were Latino (32 percent) 50,366 were white (10 percent)

STOP & FRISK RULED UNCONSTITUTIONAL •

Judge Shira A. Scheindlin, found that the Police Department resorted to a “policy of indirect racial profiling” as it increased the number of stops in minority communities. That has led to officers’ routinely stopping “blacks and Hispanics who would not have been stopped if they were white.”

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Judge Scheindlin declared that the NYPD’s general stop-and-frisk practices have violated the civil liberties and constitutional rights of all New Yorkers, citing the Fourth and Fourteenth Amendments, which protect individuals against unlawful searches and seizures and guarantee equal protection under the law. She ordered the appointment of a monitor to implement broad reforms.

STOP & FRISK RULED UNCONSTITUTIONAL • The Judge emphasized what she called the “human toll of unconstitutional stops,” noting that some of the plaintiffs testified that their encounters with the police left them feeling that they did not belong in certain areas of the city. She characterized each stop as “a demeaning and humiliating experience.”

“No one should live in fear of being stopped whenever he leaves his home to go about the activities of daily life.”