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Fourteenth Amendment: Due Process (1868)

This clause echoes the language of the Fifth Amendment, but applies to the states. It protects procedural rights – states cannot take peoples’ “life, liberty , or property without due process of law.” These rights of process include, for example, a trial by an impartial jury with evidence obtained in compliance with the Fourth Amendment’s warrant requirement. The due process clause was a basis for the Supreme Court rulings in Griswold v. Connecticut (1965) and Roe v. Wade (1973).