SENATE STATE GOVERNMENT, WAGERING, TOURISM & HISTORIC PRESERVATION COMMITTEE

STATEMENT TO

SENATE JOINT RESOLUTION No. 67

STATE OF NEW JERSEY

DATED:  MAY 14, 2018

The Senate State Government, Wagering, Tourism and Historic Preservation Committee reports favorably Senate Joint Resolution No. 67.

This joint resolution celebrates the 150th anniversary of the Fourteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.  Besides explicitly guaranteeing certain civil rights, the Fourteenth Amendment is the underlying basis for many of the Supreme Court’s most famous decisions.

     No amendment to the U.S. Constitution is cited in litigation more than the Fourteenth Amendment.  Litigation on the amendment’s Equal Protection clause led to rulings on discrimination, as in those striking down laws allowing segregated education, and the amendment’s Due Process Clause is the source for the Court’s rulings applying many of the protections in the Bill of Rights to state government action.

     The importance of the amendment is captured in the fact that scholars describe its passage as the “Second Founding” of America. Along with the other post-Civil War Amendments banning slavery and prohibiting the denial of the right to vote on account of race, the Fourteenth Amendment transformed the U.S. Constitution to one that protects fundamental rights from state as well as federal government abuse.