Retained by the people : the "silent" Ninth Amendment and the constitutional rights Americans don't know they have / Daniel A. Farber.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Farber, Daniel A., 1950-

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

United States. Constitution--9th Amendment.

United States.

Civil rights--United States.

Civil rights.

Constitutional law--United States.

Constitutional law.

Physical Description:

xiv, 236 pages ; 25 cm

Place of Publication:

New York : Basic Books, [2007]

Summary:

The Ninth Amendment Lurks Like an unexploded mine within the Bill of Rights. Its wording is direct: "The enumeration in the Constitution of certain rights shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people." However, there is not a single Supreme Court decision based on it. Even the famously ambitious Warren Court preferred to rely on the weaker support of the Fourteenth Amendment's Due Process Clause for many of its decisions on individual rights. Since that era, mainstream conservatives have grown actively hostile to the very mention of the Ninth Amendment. Daniel Farber, a law professor at the University of California at Berkeley, makes an informed and lucid argument for employing the Ninth Amendment in support of a large variety of rights whose constitutional basis is now shaky. The case he makes for the application of this unused amendment has profound implications in almost every aspect of our daily lives.

Contents:

A Reference Chart of Constitutional Provisions xiii

1 Who's Afraid of the Ninth Amendment? 1

Part I Unwritten Rights and the Constitution

2 Natural Rights and the Framers 21

3 The Debate over Whether to Have a Bill of Rights 29

4 Madison's Solution 39

5 After the Ninth 45

6 Natural Law and the Antislavery Republicans 53

7 A New Birth of Freedom 61

Part II Protecting Fundamental Rights

8 Fundamental Rights and the Due Process Clause 73

9 Fundamental Rights Today 85

10 An Invitation to Activism? 93

11 A User's Guide to the Ninth Amendment 101

Part III Applying the Ninth Amendment

12 Reproductive Rights 111

13 The End of Life 121

14 Gay Rights 131

15 Education 145

16 The Right to Government Protection 155

17 The Right to Travel and Other Rights 161

Part IV Broader Implications

18 Fundamental Rights and the Judicial Process 175

19 Joining the Rest of the World 183

20 The Ninth Amendment and the Future 197

Appendix Misunderstanding the Framers 201.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (pages 219-227) and index.

ISBN:

9780465022984

0465022987

OCLC:

82368065