The Fourteenth Amendment (320-0-1)
Instructors
Kate Masur
847/491-2849
Harris Hall - Room 202
My historical scholarship focuses primarily on the nineteenth-century United States, with an emphasis on race, gender, law and politics. I teach U.S. Women’s History, the Civil War and Reconstruction, and a variety of more specialized topics. I’ve written or edited several books, the most recent of which is *Freedom Was in Sight! A Graphic History of Reconstruction in the Washington, D.C. Region*.
Joanna Grisinger
847 491 3987
620 Lincoln St #201
I am an American legal historian who works on the modern administrative state. At Northwestern, I teach courses on law and society, U.S. legal history, gender and the law, and constitutional law. My first book, The Unwieldy American State: Administrative Politics since the New Deal (Cambridge, 2012), examines the politics of administrative law reform; I am currently working on a project about the relationship between administrative agencies and social movements.
Meeting Info
Harris Hall 107: Tues, Thurs 9:30AM - 10:50AM
Overview of class
The Fourteenth Amendment ratified in 1868, promised equal protection and due process for all, and it declared that all persons born in the United States were citizens of the United States. The amendment's consequences for American federalism were vast. But the change was even greater than that, for Americans began to understand rights differently. Much of today's rights-based culture—including ideas about the right to marry, the right to privacy, and the right to be free of discrimination—is founded in the Fourteenth Amendment and its legal and cultural legacies.
Learning Objectives
Learning Objectives (FD-HS) Students will… • Acquire knowledge ofthe Fourteenth Amendment, which is the part of the US Constitutionthat's most significant for defining and protecting individual rights.Students will learn about the origins of the amendment and itssubsequent uses and interpretations, both by the US Supreme Courtand by Americans more generally. • Develop proficiency in readingand interpretating court decisions, which involves learningspecialized language and legal conventions, developing capacity torecognize and assess complex arguments, and making connectionsacross diverse texts. • Analyze additional primary sources, includinglearning how to assess a source's context and meanings andexploring how such sources shed light on the experiences of peoplewho lived in the past. • Analyze secondary sources, including readingnot just for information but for historians' arguments about the past;assessing how historians use evidence to develop an argument; andunderstanding how historical interpretations have changed and comeinto conflict over time. • Develop capacity to think historically, whichmeans striving to understand the worldviews of people who lived indifferent times and places and exploring causes of major events. •Express the results of historical study in written and oral forms byengaging in reasoned and respectful conversations in lectures andsections, and by writing a series of papers. U.S. Overlay LearningObjectives (U.S. Perspectives on Power, Justice, and Equality)Students will. . . • Explore how pressing questions, particularly aboutrace and the status of Black Americans, prompted the creation of the14th Amendment and have been central to its interpretation eversince ratification in 1868. • Examine the Supreme Court's importantrole in constructing and enforcing formal categories of (andprotections regarding) ethnicity, gender, nationality, race, and socialstatus, often in overlapping and intersecting ways. • Investigate howpeople have used the 14th Amendment to argue for rights andinclusion not only of Black Americans but also of other racialminorities, poor people, women, and LGBTQ+ people. Assess therelative success of such claims and how the Supreme Court hasacted - and continued to act - as an arbiter of those claims underthe amendment. • Analyze how social movements and other non-court actors have shaped constitutional interpretation, throughengagement with primary sources and scholarship on historical andcontemporary legal institutions shaping racism and anti-racism;power and resistance; justice and injustice; equality and inequality;agency and subjection; and belonging and subjection. • Reflect onthe relationship between popular conversations about rights andformal, constitutional discourses; consider the role of the SupremeCourt within the broader structures of governing and power in theUnited States. Advanced Expression Learning Objectives: Studentswill. . . • Write a series of papers of increasing length and complexity,receiving feedback on each one to enable them to hone their skillsduring the quarter. • Write weekly very short responses to assignedreading, to encourage analytical reading and concise writtenexpression. • Develop skills in expository writing throughassignments that ask them to consider all sides of an issue, addressalternative interpretations, and acknowledge what remains uncertainor unknowable. • Approach writing as a process that requiresdrafting, revision, and rethinking.
Teaching Method
Class Participation Discussion Sections In class discussion LectureReadings Writing Assignments
Evaluation Method
very short writing assignments; slightly longer papers; attendanceand participation
Class Attributes
Historical Studies Foundational Discipline
Historical Studies Distro Area
U.S. Perspectives on Power, Justice, and Equity
Associated Classes
DIS - Kresge Centennial Hall 2-435: Fri 10:00AM - 10:50AM
DIS - Harris Hall L06: Fri 12:00PM - 12:50PM
DIS - Harris Hall L06: Fri 1:00PM - 1:50PM
DIS - Harris Hall L06: Fri 2:00PM - 2:50PM