Academic

Student Blogger - #13Amend Live Blog: Rights and Citizenship

A nineteenth century citizen would not have used the phrase, "You can't touch me, I'm an American citizen." This is not to say that American indignation has changed since then; rather, its source has. Professor Michael Vorenburg gave some historical context about the difference between the concepts of rights and citizenship. The corresponding nineteenth century phrase was, "You can't touch me, I'm a free person." Citizenship did not support the grant of rights, as it is often considered to today. Justice Curtis, for example, differentiated the concepts of rights and citizenship in the Dred Scott decision. Freedom supported rights against those outside an institution, while citizenship defined one's place within an institution. The Thirteenth Amendment dealt with rights and not citizenship, and many argued against the amendment on the ground that it left citizenship unaddressed. The first explicit use of citizenship in the Constitution in the Fourteenth Amendment was added to restrict that Amendment's grant of privileges to only citizens rather than all inhabitants.

Full post as published by The University of Chicago Law School Faculty Blog on April 17, 2009 (boomark / email).