How Much Does it Matter Whether Courts Work Within the "Clearly Marked" Provisions of the Bill of Rights or With the "Generalities" of the Fourteenth Amendment?

Authors

Yale Kamisar, University of Michigan Law SchoolFollow

Document Type

Article

Publication Date

1-2009

Abstract

We know that it really mattered to Justice Hugo Black. As he made clear in his famous dissenting opinion in Adamson v. California] Black was convinced that the purpose of the Fourteenth Amendment was to apply the complete protection of the Bill of Rights to the states.2 And, as he also made plain in his Adamson dissent, he was equally convinced that working with the "specific" or "explicit" guarantees of the first Eight Amendments would furnish Americans more protection than would applying the generalities of the Fourteenth Amendment.3

Recommended Citation

Kamisar, Yale. "How Much Does it Matter Whether Courts Work Within the "Clearly Marked" Provisions of the Bill of Rights or With the "Generalities" of the Fourteenth Amendment?" J. Contemp. Legal Issues 18, no. 1 (2009): 513-33.