1868government

Seward proclaims it law: the Fourteenth Amendment is part of the Constitution

The amendment settles in the document what Dred Scott left open, granting citizenship and equal protection to anyone born on American soil.

Three years after Appomattox, the Constitution still had no answer for who counted as a citizen. Dred Scott's ruling that Black Americans could never be citizens remained unreversed by the document itself. On July 9, 1868, the twenty-eighth state ratified the Fourteenth Amendment, guaranteeing citizenship and equal protection to anyone born on American soil. Secretary of State William Seward officially proclaimed it adopted on July 27, after previously certifying it conditionally on July 20.

Washington, D.C.

★ Deep dive · 1776 ClubDeep Cut: The Fourteenth Amendment Is Ratified · 4:10Unlock

The American Throughline

Every American born on U.S. soil owes their citizenship to this amendment, not the original Constitution, which never defined the term. Its Equal Protection Clause later became the legal foundation for Brown v. Board, Loving v. Virginia, and Obergefell v. Hodges, making it the most frequently litigated part of the Constitution.

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1863

Gardner surrenders Port Hudson; the Union holds the Mississippi from source to sea

After 48 days on the bluff, half his men sick and the food gone, the Confederate general yields the last rebel stronghold on the river.

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19621776 Club

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Seward proclaims it law: the Fourteenth Amendment is part of the Constitution

Saipan falls to Smith's Marines and infantry; Japan's inner defense ring is broken

Gardner surrenders Port Hudson; the Union holds the Mississippi from source to sea

Washington has the Declaration read aloud to every brigade; British ships fill the harbor

A Thor rocket detonates 250 miles up; streetlights go dark in Hawaii, and the sky turns red over the Pacific

CSS Arkansas steams alone through two Union fleets; Vicksburg's guns shelter her by nightfall

Georgia is readmitted; the last Confederate state formally returns to the Union

Shaw is killed at the parapet; the 54th Massachusetts storms Fort Wagner

Hood's first attack as commander breaks against Thomas's line north of Atlanta

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