U.S. Constitution - Bill of Rights
Amendment XIV
Section 1. All persons born or naturalized in
the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof,
are citizens of the United States and of the state wherein
they reside. No state shall make or enforce any law which
shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of
the United States; nor shall any state deprive any person
of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law;
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 twenty-one
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 and 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 any
state legislature, or as an executive or judicial officer
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 insurrection or rebellion, shall not be questioned.
But neither the United States nor any state shall assume or
pay any debt or obligation incurred in aid of insurrection
or rebellion against the United States, or any claim for the
loss or emancipation of any slave; but all such debts, obligations
and claims shall be held illegal and void. Section 5.
The Congress shall have power to enforce, by appropriate legislation,
the provisions of this article.
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