J. Robert Osborne
Thirteenth Amendment (Proposed and Ratified in 1865)
Section 1
Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as punishment for crime
whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the
United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.
Section 2
Congress shall the power to enforce this act by appropriate legislation.
Fourteenth Amendment (Proposed in 1866, Ratified in 1868)
Section 1
1 All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the
jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and the State
wherein they reside.
2 No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the
the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States;
3 nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty or property
without due process of law;
4 nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection
of the laws.
Section 2
Representatives shall be apportioned among the several States according
to their respective numbers, counting the whole number of persons in
each State, excluding Indians not taxed. But when the right to vote at any
election for the choice of electors for President and Vice-President of the
United States, Representatives in Congress, the Executive and
Judicial officers of a State, or the members of the Legislature thereof,
is denied to any of the male inhabitants of such State, being 21 years of
age, and citizens of the United States, or in any way abridged, except for
participation in rebellion, or other crime, the basis of representation
therein shall be reduced in the proportion which the number of such
male citizens shall bear to the whole number of male citizens
twenty-one years of age in such state.
Section 3
No person shall be a Senator, or Representative in Congress, or elector
of President or Vice-President, or hold any office, civil or military, under
the United States, or under any State, who, having previously taken an
oath, as a member of Congress, or as an officer of the United States,
or as a member of the State legislature, or as an executive or judicial
of any State, to support the Constitution of the United States, shall have
engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or
comfort to the enemies thereof. But Congress, may by a vote of two-thirds
of each house, remove such disability.
Section 4
The validity of the public debt of the United States, authorized by law,
including debts incurred for payment of pensions and bounties for services
in suppressing the insurrection of rebellion, shall not be questioned. But
neither the United States nor any State shall assume or p[ay any debt or
obligation incurred in aid or insurrection or rebellion against the United
States, or any claim for the loss of emancipation of any slave; but all
such debts shall be held illegal and void.
Section 5
The Congress shall have the power to enforce, by appropriate
legislation, the provisions of this article.
Fifteenth Amendment (Proposed in 1869, Ratified in 1870)
Section 1
The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or
abridged by the United States or by any State on account of race, color
or previous condition of servitude.
Section 2
The Congress shall have the power to enforce this article by appropriate
legislation.