Mandel Ngan/AFP via Getty Images

Mandel Ngan/AFP via Getty Images

The Fourteenth Amendment. Of all the amendments to the U.S. Constitution, the 14th is a big one. It’s shaped all of our lives, whether we realize it or not: Roe v. Wade, Brown v. Board of Education, Bush v. Gore, plus other Supreme Court cases that legalized same-sex marriage, interracial marriage, access to birth control — they’ve all been built on the back of the 14th. The amendment was ratified after the Civil War, and it’s packed full of lofty phrases like due process, equal protection, and liberty. But what do those words really guarantee us? Today on Throughline’s We the People: How the 14th Amendment has remade America — and how America has remade the 14th (Originally ran as The Fourteenth Amendment).

Guests:

Kenneth Mack, the Lawrence D. Biele Professor of Law and Affiliate Professor of History at Harvard University.

Vernon Burton, the Judge Matthew J. Perry Distinguished Professor of History at Clemson University.

To access bonus episodes and listen to Throughline sponsor-free, subscribe to Throughline+ via Apple Podcasts or at plus.npr.org/throughline.