third amendment to the united states constitution - wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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Third Amendment to the United StatesConstitutionFrom Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The Third Amendment (Amendment III) to the United StatesConstitution places restrictions on the quartering of soldiers in private homeswithout the owner's consent, forbidding the practice in peacetime. Theamendment is a response to Quartering Acts passed by the Britishparliament during the American Revolutionary War, which had allowed theBritish Army to lodge soldiers in private residences.
The Third Amendment was introduced in Congress in 1789 by JamesMadison as a part of the United States Bill of Rights, in response to Anti-Federalist objections to the new Constitution. Congress proposed theamendment to the states on September 28, 1789, and by December 15,1791, the necessary three-quarters of the states had ratified it. Secretary ofState Thomas Jefferson announced the adoption of the amendment onMarch 1, 1792.
The amendment is one of the least controversial of the Constitution and israrely litigated. As of 2009, it had never been the primary basis of a
Supreme Court decision.[1][2]
Contents
1 Text2 Adoption
2.1 Background2.2 Proposal and ratification
3 Judicial interpretation4 See also
5 References
6 External links
Text
No Soldier shall, in time of peace be quartered in any house, withoutthe consent of the Owner, nor in time of war, but in a manner to be
prescribed by law.[3]
Adoption
Background
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Other countries · Law Portal
The Bill of Rights in the National
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James Madison, drafter of
the Bill of Rights
In 1765, the British parliament enacted the first of the Quartering Acts,requiring the American colonies to pay the costs of British soldiers serving inthe colonies, and requiring that if the local barracks provided insufficientspace, that the colonists lodge the troops in alehouses, inns, and liverystables. After the Boston Tea Party, the Quartering Act of 1774 wasenacted. One of the Intolerable Acts that pushed the colonies towardrevolution, it authorized British troops to be housed wherever necessary,
including in private homes.[4] The quartering of troops was cited as one ofthe colonists' grievances in the United States Declaration of
Independence.[1]
After several years of comparatively weak government under the Articlesof Confederation, a Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia proposed anew constitution on September 17, 1787, featuring a stronger chiefexecutive and other changes. George Mason, a Constitutional Conventiondelegate and the drafter of Virginia's Declaration of Rights, proposed that abill of rights listing and guaranteeing civil liberties be included. Otherdelegates—including future Bill of Rights drafter James Madison—disagreed, arguing that existing stateguarantees of civil liberties were sufficient and that any attempt to enumerate individual rights risked theimplication that other, unnamed rights were unprotected. After a brief debate, Mason's proposal was defeated
by a unanimous vote of the state delegations.[5]
For the constitution to be ratified, however, nine of the thirteen states were required to approve it in stateconventions. Opposition to ratification ("Anti-Federalism") was partly based on the Constitution's lack ofadequate guarantees for civil liberties. Supporters of the Constitution in states where popular sentiment wasagainst ratification (including Virginia, Massachusetts, and New York) successfully proposed that their stateconventions both ratify the Constitution and call for the addition of a bill of rights. Several state conventions
specifically proposed a provision against the quartering of troops in private homes.[1] At the 1788 VirginiaRatifying Convention, Patrick Henry stated, "One of our first complaints, under the former government, was thequartering of troops among us. This was one of the principal reasons for dissolving the connection with GreatBritain. Here we may have troops in time of peace. They may be billeted in any manner — to tyrannize,
oppress, and crush us."[4]
Proposal and ratification
In the 1st United States Congress, following the state legislatures' request,James Madison proposed twenty constitutional amendments based on state billsof rights and English sources such as the Bill of Rights 1689; one of these was aprohibition against quartering troops in private homes. Several revisions to thefuture Third Amendment were proposed in Congress, which chiefly differed inthe way in which peace and war were distinguished (including the possibility of asituation, such as unrest, which was neither peace nor war), and whether the
executive or the legislature would have the authority to authorize quartering.[6]
However, the amendment ultimately passed Congress almost unchanged and by
unanimous vote.[1] Congress reduced Madison's proposed twenty amendmentsto twelve, and these were submitted to the states for ratification on September
25, 1789.[7]
By the time the Bill of Rights was submitted to the states for ratification,opinions had shifted in both parties. Many Federalists, who had previouslyopposed a Bill of Rights, now supported the Bill as a means of silencing the Anti-Federalists' most effective
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Justice William O. Douglas
criticism. Many Anti-Federalists, in contrast, now opposed it, realizing that the Bill's adoption would greatly
lessen the chances of a second constitutional convention, which they desired.[8] Anti-Federalists such as RichardHenry Lee also argued that the Bill left the most objectionable portions of the Constitution, such as the federal
judiciary and direct taxation, intact.[9]
On November 20, 1789, New Jersey ratified eleven of the twelve amendments, rejecting Article II, whichregulated Congressional pay raises. On December 19 and 22, respectively, Maryland and North Carolina
ratified all twelve amendments.[10] On January 19, 25, and 28, 1790, respectively, South Carolina, NewHampshire, and Delaware ratified the Bill, though New Hampshire rejected the amendment on Congressional
pay raises, and Delaware rejected Article I, which regulated the size of the House.[10] This brought the total ofratifying states to six of the required ten, but the process stalled in other states: Connecticut and Georgia found aBill of Rights unnecessary and so refused to ratify, while Massachusetts ratified most of the amendments, but
failed to send official notice to the Secretary of State that it had done so.[9][a]
In February through June of 1790, New York, Pennsylvania, and Rhode Island ratified eleven of theamendments, though all three rejected the amendment on Congressional pay raises. Virginia initially postponedits debate, but after Vermont was admitted to the Union in 1791, the total number of states needed forratification rose to eleven. Vermont ratified on November 3, 1791, approving all twelve amendments, and
Virginia finally followed on December 15, 1791.[9] Secretary of State Thomas Jefferson announced the
adoption of the ten successfully ratified amendments on March 1, 1792.[11]
Judicial interpretation
The Third Amendment is among the least cited sections of the U.S.
Constitution.[12] In the words of Encyclopedia Britannica, "as thehistory of the country progressed with little conflict on American soil,
the amendment has had little occasion to be invoked."[13] As of 2009,no major Supreme Court decision has used the amendment as its
primary basis.[1][2]
The Third Amendment has been invoked in a few instances as helping
establish an implicit right to privacy in the Constitution.[14] JusticeWilliam O. Douglas used the amendment along with others in the Billof Rights as a partial basis for the majority decision in Griswold v.
Connecticut (1965),[15] which cited the Third Amendment asimplying a belief that an individual's home should be free from agents
of the state.[14]
In one of the seven opinions in Youngstown Sheet & Tube Co. v.Sawyer (1952), Justice Robert H. Jackson cited the ThirdAmendment as providing evidence of the Framers' intent to constrain
executive power even during wartime:[14]
"[t]hat military powers of the Commander in Chief were not to supersede representativegovernment of internal affairs seems obvious from the Constitution and from elementary Americanhistory. Time out of mind, and even now in many parts of the world, a military commander canseize private housing to shelter his troops. Not so, however, in the United States, for the ThirdAmendment says...[E]ven in war time, his seizure of needed military housing must be authorized by
Congress."[16]
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One of the few times a federal court was asked to invalidate a law or action on Third Amendment grounds was
in Engblom v. Carey (1982).[17] In 1979, prison officials in New York organized a strike; they were evictedfrom their prison facility residences, which were reassigned to members of the National Guard who hadtemporarily taken their place as prison guards. The United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit ruled:(1) that the term owner in the Third Amendment includes tenants (paralleling similar cases regarding the FourthAmendment, governing search and seizure), (2) National Guard troops count as soldiers for the purposes of theThird Amendment, and (3) that the Third Amendment is incorporated (that is, that it applies to the states) by
virtue of the Fourteenth Amendment.[18] The case was remanded to the district court, which dismissed the case
on the grounds that state officials could not have been aware of this interpretation.[19]
In an earlier case, United States v. Valenzuela (1951),[20] the defendant asked that a federal rent-control lawbe struck down because it was "the incubator and hatchery of swarms of bureaucrats to be quartered as storm
troopers upon the people in violation of Amendment III of the United States Constitution."[21] The court
declined his request. Later, in Jones v. United States Secretary of Defense (1972),[22] Army reservistsunsuccessfully cited the Third Amendment as justification for refusing to march in a parade. Similar arguments in
a variety of contexts have been denied in other cases.[23]
See also
Dragonnades
References
Notes
a. ^ All three states would later ratify the Bill of Rights for sesquicentennial celebrations in 1939.[9]
Citations
1. ̂a b c d e Mahoney, Dennis J. (1986). "Third Amendment" (http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1G2-3425002516.html). Encyclopedia of the American Constitution. – via HighBeam Research (subscription
required). Retrieved July 15, 2013.
2. ̂a b "Third Amendment" (http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1G2-3048900607.html). U*X*L Encyclopedia ofU.S. History. – via HighBeam Research (subscription required). January 1, 2009. Retrieved July 15, 2013.
3. ^ "Bill of Rights (1791)" (http://www.pbs.org/wnet/supremecourt/democracy/sources_document3.html). PBS.December 2006.
4. ̂a b Alderman and Kennedy, pp. 107-108
5. ^ Beeman, pp. 341–43
6. ^ Bell, pp. 135–36
7. ^ "Bill of Rights" (http://www.archives.gov/exhibits/charters/bill_of_rights.html). National Archives. Archived(http://www.webcitation.org/6Fcz4pEP4) from the original on April 4, 2013. Retrieved April 4, 2013.
8. ^ Wood, p. 71
9. ̂a b c d Levy, Leonard W. (1986). "Bill of Rights (United States)" (http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1G2-3425000220.html). Encyclopedia of the American Constitution. – via HighBeam Research (subscription
required). Retrieved July 16, 2013.
10. ̂a b Labunski, p. 245
11. ^ Labunski, p. 255
12. ^ Bell, p. 140
13. ^ "Third Amendment" (http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/592331/Third-Amendment). EncyclopediaBritannica. Retrieved July 19, 2013.
14. ̂a b c Amar, p. 62
15. ^ 381 U.S. 479, 484 (1965)
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15. ^ 381 U.S. 479, 484 (1965)
16. ^ Youngstown Sheet & Tube Co. v. Sawyer, 343 U.S. 579, 644 (1952)
17. ^ 677 F.2d 957 (2d. Cir. 1982)
18. ^ Bell, p. 143
19. ^ Young, Stephen E. (2003). The Posse Comitatus Act of 1878: A Documentary History(http://books.google.com/books?id=nKJnkkGwkngC&pg=RA1-PA94&dq=engblom+remanded&hl=en&sa=X&ei=6M7xUeWGDe614AORmIHIDQ&ved=0CEkQ6AEwBA#v=onepage&q=engblom%20remanded&f=false). Wm. S. Hein Publishing. p. CRS-14 (fn29). Retrieved 25 July2013.
20. ^ 95 F. Supp. 363 (S.D. Cal. 1951)
21. ^ Bell, p. 142
22. ^ 346 F. Supp. 97 (D. Minn. 1972)
23. ^ Bell, pp. 141–42
Bibliography
Alderman, Ellen and Caroline Kennedy (1991). In Our Defense. Avon.
Amar, Akhil Reed (1998). The Bill of Rights. Yale University Press.
Beeman, Richard (2009). Plain, Honest Men: The Making of the American Constitution. Random
House.Bell, Tom W. (1993) "The Third Amendment: Forgotten but Not Gone
(http://scholarship.law.wm.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1534&context=wmborj)". William & Mary
Bill of Rights Journal 2.1: pp. 117-150.Labunski, Richard E. (2006). James Madison and the struggle for the Bill of Rights. Oxford
University Press.
Wood, Gordon S. (2009). Empire of Liberty: A History of the Early Republic, 1789–1815. Oxford
University Press.
External links
CRS Annotated Constitution: Third Amendment
(http://www.law.cornell.edu/anncon/html/amdt3toc_user.html)
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