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Opinion | The Constitution Has a 155-Year-Old Answer to the Debt Ceiling [1]

['Eric Foner']

Date: 2023-01-23

The 14th Amendment, added to the Constitution in the wake of the Civil War, has been back in the news of late, mostly because the Supreme Court has taken aim at past decisions, notably Roe v. Wade, that employed it to protect Americans’ liberties. The amendment remains the most significant addition to the Constitution since the adoption of the Bill of Rights. Its magnificent first section established the principle of birthright citizenship and prohibited the states from denying to any person the equal protection of the laws, laying the foundation for many of the rights Americans prize.

Long-forgotten provisions of the 14th Amendment are suddenly crying out for enforcement. Section 2 provides for a reduction in the number of representatives allocated to states that deny the right to vote to any “male citizens.” (Today this penalty would apply to the disenfranchisement of women as well.) Even at the height of the Jim Crow era, when millions of African Americans were prevented from voting, this penalty was never imposed. But with many states seriously limiting voting rights, its time may have come.

Section 3 bars from public office anyone who took an oath to support the Constitution and subsequently participated in or encouraged “insurrection.” The events of Jan. 6, 2021, have focused new attention on this stipulation, which could be applied to participants in the uprising who previously held military, political, or judicial positions, including former President Donald Trump.

Then there is Section 4, which offers a way out of the current impasse over increasing the debt ceiling. “The validity of the public debt of the United States,” it declares, “shall not be questioned.”

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[1] Url: https://www.nytimes.com/2023/01/23/opinion/fourteenth-amendment-debt-ceiling.html

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