Well, technically, not all of the rights in the Bill of Rights have been applied to the states through the 14th Amendment, but most of them have, including the First Amendment, which is the subject of this discussion. (But to be strictly accurate, states are permitted to indict people for a felony without using a grand jury, despite one clause of the 5th Amendment, and are not required to use juries in civil cases, despite the 7th Amendment. And there is one big undecided issue-- the Supreme Court has not yet decided if the Second Amendment binds the states. I think everything else in the Bill of Rights has been held to be included in the 14th Amendment.)
>> Well, technically, not all of the rights in the Bill of Rights have been applied to the states through the 14th Amendment, but most of them have, including the First Amendment, which is the subject of this discussion.
Actually - I am aware of that (it has been a few years since I’ve taken a Constitutional Law class, though). I opted to leave that tidbit of information out, as it seemed like a bit of a useless footnote in a somewhat complicated Constitutional argument.
>> ... to be strictly accurate, states are permitted to indict people for a felony without using a grand jury, despite one clause of the 5th Amendment, and are not required to use juries in civil cases, despite the 7th Amendment.
I remembered the jury trial exclusion (which is why I didn’t include it in my list) - though I did forget about the grand jury exclusion. Ah well - I guess I could use a Con Law refresher.
>> And there is one big undecided issue— the Supreme Court has not yet decided if the Second Amendment binds the states.
I’d bet most of the anti-incorporation voices in this thread would come down on the other side in the 2nd amendment case. So much for consistency.
H