United States Bill of Rights
In the United States, the Bill of Rights is the name by which the first ten amendments to
the United States Constitution are known.[1] They were introduced by James Madison to
the First United States Congress in 1789 as a series of articles, and came into effect on
December 15, 1791, when they had been ratified by three-fourths of the States.
Thomas Jefferson was a proponent of the Bill of Rights.[2]

The Bill of Rights prohibits Congress from making any law respecting an establishment
of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof, forbids infringement of "...the right
of the people to keep and bear Arms...", and prohibits the federal government from
depriving any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law. In federal
criminal cases, it requires indictment by grand jury for any capital or "infamous crime",
guarantees a speedy public trial with an impartial jury composed of members of the
state or judicial district in which the crime occurred, and prohibits double jeopardy. In
addition, the Bill of Rights states that "the enumeration in the Constitution, of certain
rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people,"[3]
and reserves all powers not granted to the federal government to the citizenry or
States. Most of these restrictions were later applied to the states by a series of decisions
applying the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, which was ratified in
1868, after the American Civil War.

Madison proposed the Bill of Rights while ideological conflict between Federalists and
anti-Federalists, dating from the 1787 Philadelphia Convention, threatened the overall
ratification of the new national Constitution. It largely responded to the Constitution's
influential opponents, including prominent Founding Fathers, who argued that the
Constitution should not be ratified because it failed to protect the basic principles of
human liberty. The Bill was influenced by George Mason's 1776 Virginia Declaration of
Rights, the 1689 English Bill of Rights, works of the Age of Enlightenment pertaining to
natural rights, and earlier English political documents such as Magna Carta (1215).

Two additional articles were proposed to the States; only the final ten articles were
ratified quickly and correspond to the First through Tenth Amendments to the
Constitution. The first Article, dealing with the number and apportionment of U.S.
Representatives, never became part of the Constitution. The second Article, limiting the
ability of Congress to increase the salaries of its members, was ratified two centuries
later as the 27th Amendment. Though they are incorporated into the document known
as the "Bill of Rights", neither article establishes a right as that term is used today. For
that reason, and also because the term had been applied to the first ten amendments
long before the 27th Amendment was ratified, the term "Bill of Rights" in modern U.S.
usage means only the ten amendments ratified in 1791.

The Bill of Rights plays a central role in American law and government, and remains a
fundamental symbol of the freedoms and culture of the nation. One of the original
fourteen copies of the Bill of Rights is on public display at the National Archives in
Washington, D.C.


Second Amendment to the United States Constitution

The Second Amendment (Amendment II) to the United States Constitution is the part of
the United States Bill of Rights that protects a right to keep and bear arms from
infringement by the federal government, including federal enclaves and Washington,
D.C.[1] The Second Amendment was adopted on December 15, 1791, along with the
rest of the Bill of Rights. The American Bar Association has noted that there is more
disagreement and less understanding about this right than of any other current issue
regarding the Constitution.[2]

For almost a century following the ratification of the Bill of Rights, the intended
meaning and application of the Second Amendment drew less interest than it does in
modern times.[3] Notable U.S. Supreme Court interpretations of the Second
Amendment include those in United States v. Cruikshank (1875), Presser v. Illinois
(1886), Miller v. Texas (1894), Robertson v. Baldwin (1897), United States v. Miller

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