Penguin Guide to the United States Constitution: A Fully Annotated Declaration of Independence by Richard Beeman

to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.
    The Second Amendment contains two parts: a preface, which states that a “well regulated Militia” (meaning a citizens’ army authorized by the state) is a necessary and desirable thing, and the operative section of the amendment, which asserts the right of the people to keep and bear arms. Constitutional scholars have argued vociferously about whether the comma separating those two parts signifies that the right to keep and bear arms without state interference is confined to the use of such arms in conjunction with one’s duties as part of a government-sanctioned militia or army, or whether there is an individual right to keep and bear arms under any circumstances. The most recent ruling of the Supreme Court ( District of Columbia v. Heller , 2008) suggests that the Second Amendment does guarantee an individual, as well as a collective, right to bear arms, but the Court has also conceded that there are some instances (e.g., regulating the sale of assault weapons) in which local, state, and federal governments do have the right to regulate the sale and use of arms. Like many aspects of the Constitution, the meaning of the Second Amendment is subject to varying interpretations.

AMENDMENT III (1791)
    No Soldier shall, in time of peace be quartered in any house, without the consent of the Owner, nor in time of war, but in a manner to be prescribed by law.
    This amendment, which has lost much of its immediacy over the course of time, was considered of pressing importance by the members of the First Congress, who drafted it because attempts to force Americans to provide lodgings for British troops (whom they considered to be hostile occupiers of their land) during the years leading to the Revolution were an important cause of that revolution. The amendment does, “in a manner to be prescribed by law,” allow the government to use private homes to provide lodging for its own soldiers in time of war. More generally, the Third Amendment has—along with the Fourth, Fifth, and Ninth Amendments—been interpreted to imply another right not explicitly mentioned in the Constitution: the right of privacy.

AMENDMENT IV (1791)
    The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.
    The guarantees against “unreasonable searches and seizures” of persons, houses, and property, and the insistence that any such searches be based on “probable cause” and accompanied by search warrants, were another product of Americans’ experience during the Revolution, when British customs officers and soldiers carried out blanket searches and seizures without proper warrants. In recent years, through use of the incorporation doctrine, the Fourth Amendment has been interpreted to mean that police officers at all levels of government must demonstrate probable cause before stopping and searching anyone whom they might suspect of a crime. The precise definition of “probable cause” has been much debated, and in many cases police officers are forced to make difficult judgments about whether they should detain an individual and search his or her possessions.
    In an age in which advances in technology have offered the government new ways to gather evidence of a possible crime—e.g., wiretapping and other means of sophisticated electronic surveillance—the federal courts have been presented with new dilemmas about how to interpret the provisions of the Fourth Amendment. Enactment of the Patriot Act in the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks in 2001 has significantly expanded the government’s ability to carry out such surveillance.

AMENDMENT V (1791)
    No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime,