Okay, now we go to the 13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments to the Constitution. There's three amendments to the Constitution that are important for us to remember in this course because they address specifically the issue of involuntary immigration and for the first time define citizenship in the United States. And these are the 13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments to the Constitution.
Now the 14th Amendment is key here. It is one of the post-Civil War amendments, also known as the Reconstruction Amendments, and it was intended to secure rights for former slaves. The 14th Amendment includes the Due Process and Equal Protection Clauses, amongst others.
The amendment provides a broad definition of United States citizenship, superseding the U.S. Supreme Court's decision in Dred Scott v. Sanford that had excluded slaves imported from Africa and their descendants. The amendment requires states to provide equal protection under the law to all persons within their jurisdictions.
And it was used in the mid-20th century to dismantle racial segregation in the United States, as in Brown v. Board of Education. Now, its due process has been the basis of much important and controversial case law regarding privacy rights abortion, and other issues. And then the other two post-Civil War amendments are the 13th Amendment banning slavery and the 15th Amendment banning race-based voting qualifications.