The Need for Amendment Nine
- mxrowan7
- May 15
- 4 min read
“The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.”
In simple terms: Even if a right isn't explicitly stated, you can't use that to deny people their rights.
Right now, we are experiencing a major shift in The Overton Window. Which is to say, the realms of political acceptability have been shifted further into the realm of conservatism. Things once considered unthinkable – publicly approving of neo-nazis, for example – are now accepted as reasonable.
Because of this, a much more conservative view of people's rights and freedoms has become accepted in higher courts. Justices are more likely to deny people rights that aren't explicitly stated in the constitution.
Unfortunately, that goes against the bill of rights.
Because Amendment Nine of the bill of rights protects exactly those rights.
Our founding fathers had a long, grueling debate about even having a bill of rights. “Enumerating any rights, Founding Father James Wilson argued, might imply that all those not listed were surrendered. And, because it was impossible to enumerate all the rights of the people, a bill of rights might actually be construed to justify the government’s power to limit any liberties of the people that were not enumerated.” After much back and forth between those for and against a bill of rights, one was created... With the added protection of Amendment Nine.
The founding fathers knew that they couldn't explicitly state and number all human rights. There would be things in the future they couldn't even conceive of to defend, or defend against.
Until relatively recently, the Ninth Amendment was considered almost a joke. People couldn't fathom what it could mean. Then, in 1965, Griswold Vs Connecticut confirmed what the founding fathers meant it to be: a way to stop infringements upon personal rights and liberties by future governments. The Supreme Court found that bans on contraception infringed upon the right to marital privacy. Which means, although not stated outright, that we the people HAVE the right to marital privacy. The Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA) Privacy Rule also adds right to privacy of protected health information, and especially privacy protection for individually identifiable health information.
With new forces trying to strip away rights to privacy, it seems people don't fully realize how well their rights were intended to be protected. People argue that the founding fathers would support rights being stripped by the government, when Amendment 9 and the arguments of its creation suggest the opposite to be true. The founding fathers argued over the bill of rights not because they felt it wasn't needed – they argued about its creation for fear that a lack of enumeration of every possible right might let it be used to deny people of rights. Which seems to be precisely what is happening now, in our time.
So please, research the Ninth Amendment.
Remind your representatives, our justices, and others of its intent.
Don't let extremists shift The Overton Window even further.
It starts with us.
Works Cited:
Barnett, Randy. “Reconceiving the Ninth Amendment Recommended Citation.” Cornell Law Review, vol. 74, 1988, scholarship.law.cornell.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=3396&context=clr. Accessed 2024.
Berger, Raoul. “Ninth Amendment Recommended Citation.” Cornell Law Review, vol. 66, no. 1, 1980, scholarship.law.cornell.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=4218&context=clr. Accessed 2024.
“Constitutional Amendments – Amendment 9 – “Enumerated Rights of the People.”” Ronald Reagan, 2024, www.reaganlibrary.gov/constitutional-amendments-amendment-9-enumerated-rights-people. Accessed 2024.
“Griswold v. Connecticut, 381 U.S. 479 (1965).” Justia Law, 2024, supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/381/479/. Accessed 2024.
“HIPAA and Reproductive Health.” HHS.gov, 29 June 2022, www.hhs.gov/hipaa/for-professionals/special-topics/reproductive-health/index.html. Accessed 2024.
Knowlton, Sanford, and Kelsey Knowlton H. “The Ninth Amendment of the Federal Constitution.” Indiana Law Journal Indiana Law Journal, vol. 11, no. 4, 1936, pp. 4–1936, www.repository.law.indiana.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=4803&context=ilj. Accessed 2024.
Levinson, Sanford. “Constitutional Rhetoric and the Ninth Amendment.” Chicago-Kent Law Review, vol. 64, no. 1, 1988, scholarship.kentlaw.iit.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?referer=&httpsredir=1&article=2714&context=cklawreview. Accessed 2024.
Symposium on Interpreting the Ninth Amendment, Article 7.
Massey, Calvin. “Federalism and Fundamental Rights: The Ninth Amendment Federalism and Fundamental Rights: The Ninth Amendment.” Hastings Law Journal, vol. 38, pp. 1–1987, repository.uclawsf.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=2889&context=hastings_law_journal. Accessed 2024.
Mcaffee, Thomas. The Original Meaning of the Ninth Amendment . University of Nevada, Las Vegas -- William S. Boyd School of Law, 1990.
Scholarly Works. 520. https://scholars.law.unlv.edu/facpub/520.
Nass, Sharyl J, et al. “Introduction.” Nih.gov, National Academies Press (US), 2024, www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK9576/#:~:text=The%20Health%20Insurance%20Portability%20and,Americans%20with%20health%20insurance%20coverage. Accessed 2024.
“Ninth Amendment.” LII / Legal Information Institute, 2024, www.law.cornell.edu/constitution/ninth_amendment. Accessed 2024.
“Ninth Amendment | Definition, Text, & Interpretation | Britannica.” Encyclopædia Britannica, 2024, www.britannica.com/topic/Ninth-Amendment. Accessed 2024.
Publications, Law, and Kurt Lash. UR Scholarship Repository the Lost Original Meaning of the Ninth Amendment. 2004.
Randy E. Barnett, and Louis Michael Seidman. “Interpretation: The Ninth Amendment.” Constitutioncenter.org, 2024, constitutioncenter.org/the-constitution/amendments/amendment-ix/interpretations/131. Accessed 2024.
Russell L. Caplan. “The History and Meaning of the Ninth Amendment on JSTOR.” Jstor.org, 2024, www.jstor.org/stable/1072779?read-now=1&seq=3#page_scan_tab_contents. Accessed 2024.
“US Government for Kids: Ninth Amendment.” Ducksters.com, 2024, www.ducksters.com/history/us_government/ninth_amendment.php. Accessed 2024.
Wikipedia Contributors. “The Overton Window.” Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, 27 June 2024, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Overton_window. Accessed 2024.
“Your Rights under HIPAA.” HHS.gov, 7 May 2008, www.hhs.gov/hipaa/for-individuals/guidance-materials-for-consumers/index.html. Accessed 2024.
Comments