List of amendments to the United States Constitution

This is a complete full list of all ratified and unratified amendments to the United States Constitution which have received the approval of the Congress. The procedure for amending the Constitution is governed by Article V of the original text. There have been proposals for amendments to the United States Constitution for amendments introduced in Congress, but not submitted to the states.

Ratified amendments

There are currently twenty seven articles of amendment to the United States Constitution. The first ten of these were ratified simultaneously and are known as the Bill of Rights.

Notes

# The first ten amendments, as well as the twenty-seventh amendment to the Constitution were proposed as part of a group of "twelve" proposed amendments on September 25, 1789. The first two of these twelve were not ratified immediately. What we know today as the First through Tenth Amendments were actually the third through twelfth items on the list. The second of the proposed amendments eventually became the Twenty-seventh Amendment, its ratification being completed over 200 years later, in 1992. The first proposed amendment, the "Congressional Apportionment Amendment", has yet to be ratified.
# June 15, 1804, is the date the Twelfth Amendment was ratified by the New Hampshire legislature. However, the New Hampshire Governor vetoed the ratification on June 20, 1804. It is widely believed that a state's governor lacks the power to approve or veto a ratification made by that state's legislature. (See "Hollingsworth v. Virginia" from 1798.) If the veto was effective, then the amendment nevertheless became part of the Constitution on July 27, 1804, when it was ratified by Tennessee.
# July 9, 1868, is the date the Fourteenth Amendment received its 28th ratification, accounting for three quarters of the states in the Union at the time. However, prior to that date, Ohio and New Jersey had "withdrawn" their earlier ratifications of the amendment. Such withdrawals are generally held to be ineffective. If the withdrawals "were" effective, then the amendment nevertheless became part of the Constitution on July 13, 1868, when Georgia ratified it.
# February 3, 1870, is the date the Fifteenth Amendment received its 28th ratification, accounting for three quarters of the states in the Union at the time. However, prior to that date, New York had "withdrawn" its earlier ratification of the amendment. Such withdrawals are generally held to be ineffective. If one assumes that the withdrawal "was" effective, then the amendment nevertheless became part of the Constitution on February 17, 1870, when Nebraska ratified it.

Unratified proposed amendments

Before an amendment can take effect, it must be proposed to the states by a two-thirds vote of both houses of Congress, and ratified by three-quarters of the states. Six amendments proposed by Congress have failed to be ratified by the appropriate number of states' legislatures. Four of these amendments are still technically pending before state lawmakers—the other two have expired by their own terms.

See also

* List of unsuccessful attempts to amend the U.S. Constitution
*Conventions within the states to ratify an amendment to U.S. Constitution
*Convention to propose amendment to U.S. Constitution

References

* Congressional Research Service. (1992). "The Constitution of the United States of America: Analysis and Interpretation." (Senate Document No. 103–6). (Johnny H. Killian and George A. Costello, Eds.). Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office.

External links

* "The Constitution of the United States of America: Analysis and Interpretation" is available at:
** [http://www.gpoaccess.gov/constitution/browse.html GPO Access] - Official version of the document at the U.S. Government Printing Office.
** [http://supreme.lp.findlaw.com/constitution/index.html FindLaw] – FindLaw's version of the official document; incorporates 1996 and 1998 supplements into text, but does not include prefatory material included in official version.