Part 71 (1/2)

ARTICLE IV. MISCELLANEOUS PROVISIONS.

SECTION I. STATE RECORDS.

Full faith and credit shall be given in each State to the public acts, records, and judicial proceedings of every other State. And the Congress may by general laws prescribe the manner in which, such acts, records, and proceedings shall be proved, and the effect thereof.

SECTION II. PRIVILEGES OF CITIZENS.

1ST CLAUSE. The citizens of each State shall be ent.i.tled to all privileges and immunities of citizens in the several States.

2nd CLAUSE. A person charged in any State with treason, felony, or other crime, who shall flee from justice, and be found in another State, shall, on demand of the executive authority of the State from which he fled, be delivered up, to be removed to the State having jurisdiction of the crime.

3rd CLAUSE. No person held to service or labor in one State, under the laws thereof, escaping into another, shall, in consequence of any law or regulation therein, be discharged from such service or labor, but shall be delivered up on claim of the party to whom such service or labor may be due.

SECTION III. NEW STATES AND TERRITORIES.

1ST CLAUSE. New States may be admitted by the Congress into this Union; but no new State shall be formed or erected within the jurisdiction of any other State; nor any State be formed by the junction of two or more States or parts of States, without the consent of the legislatures of the States concerned as well as of the Congress.

2nd CLAUSE. The Congress shall have power to dispose of and make all needful rules and regulations respecting the territory or other property belonging to the United States; and nothing in this Const.i.tution shall be so construed as to prejudice any claims of the United States or of any particular State.

SECTION IV. Guarantees to the States.

The United States shall guarantee to every State in this Union a republican form of government, and shall protect each of them against invasion; and on application of the legislature, or of the executive (when the legislature cannot be convened), against domestic violence.

ARTICLE V. POWERS OP AMENDMENT.

The Congress, whenever two-thirds of both houses shall deem it necessary, shall propose amendments to this Const.i.tution, or, on the application of the legislatures of two-thirds of the several States, shall call a convention for proposing amendments, which, in either case, shall be valid, to all intents and purposes, as part of this Const.i.tution, when ratified by the legislatures of three-fourths of the several States, or by conventions in three- fourths thereof, as the one or the other mode of ratification may be proposed by the Congress: provided that no amendment which may be made prior to the year one thousand eight hundred and eight shall in any manner affect the first and fourth clauses in the ninth section of the first article; and that no State, without its consent, shall be deprived of its equal suffrage in the Senate.

ARTICLE VI. PUBLIC DEBT, SUPREMACY OF THE CONSt.i.tUTION, OATH OF OFFICE, RELIGIOUS TEST.

1st Clause. All debts contracted and engagements entered into before the adoption of this Const.i.tution, shall be as valid against the United States under this Const.i.tution, as under the Confederation.

2nd Clause. This Const.i.tution, and the laws of the United States which shall be made in pursuance thereof, and all treaties made, or which shall be made, under the authority of the United States, shall be the supreme law of the land; and the judges in every State shall be bound thereby, anything in the Const.i.tution or laws of any State to the contrary notwithstanding.

3rd Clause. The senators and representatives before mentioned, and the members of the several State legislatures, and all executive and judicial officers, both of the United States and of the several States, shall be bound by oath or affirmation to support this Const.i.tution; but no religious test shall ever be required as a qualification to any office or public trust under the United States.

ARTICLE VII. RATIFICATION OF THE CONSt.i.tUTION.

The ratification of the conventions of nine States shall be sufficient for the establishment of this Const.i.tution between the States so ratifying the same.

AMENDMENTS

PROPOSED BY CONGRESS AND RATIFIED BY THE LEGISLATURES OF THE SEVERAL STATES, PURSUANT TO THE FIFTH ARTICLE OF THE ORIGINAL CONSt.i.tUTION.

ARTICLE I. FREEDOM OF RELIGION.

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to a.s.semble, and to pet.i.tion the government for a redress of grievances.

ARTICLE II. RIGHT TO BEAR ARMS.

A well-regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.