Bill of Rights
The first ten amendments to the US Constitution, ratified in 1791, listing the basic rights — speech, religion, arms, due process, jury trial — that the federal government may not infringe.
Origin
Anti-Federalists refused to ratify the 1787 Constitution unless an explicit list of protected rights was added. James Madison drafted twelve amendments; ten were ratified by 1791. The First Amendment protects religion, speech, press, assembly, and petition; the Second arms; the Fourth privacy from search; the Fifth and Sixth criminal procedure; the Eighth bans cruel and unusual punishment; the Tenth reserves to the states (or the people) any power not delegated to the federal government. The list was originally a check only on the federal government; through the 14th Amendment (1868) and a long line of Supreme Court rulings it now applies to the states too — a process called 'incorporation.' The phrase 'Bill of Rights' is older — England's 1689 Bill of Rights, after the Glorious Revolution, supplied both the name and several of the underlying ideas.
Modern usage
Universally cited in US speech as the floor of American freedom — 'First Amendment rights,' 'pleading the Fifth,' 'cruel and unusual,' 'Second Amendment rights' are everyday phrases. Free-speech debates worldwide tend to import 'First Amendment' reasoning even where it doesn't legally apply. The original parchment is on display alongside the Declaration and Constitution in the National Archives.
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