The first clause in this section prevents Congress from passing any law that would restrict the importation of slaves into the United States prior to 1808. Congress could, however, levy a per capita duty of up to ten Spanish milled dollars for each slave imported into the country. This clause was further entrenched into the Constitution by Article 5, where it is explicitly shielded from constitutional amendment prior to 1808. On March 2, 1807, Congress approved legislation prohibiting the importation of slaves into the United States, which went into effect January 1, 1808, the first day of the prohibition permitted by the Constitution.

Clauses 2 and 3: Civil and legal protections.

A writ of habeas corpus is a legal action against unlawful detainment that commands a law enforcement agency or other body that has a person in custody to have a court inquire into the legality of the detention. The court may order the person released if the reason for detention is deemed insufficient or unjustifiable. The Constitution further provides that the privilege of the writ of habeas corpus may not be suspended "unless when in cases of rebellion or invasion the public safety may require it". In Ex parte Milligan (1866), the Supreme Court ruled that the suspension of habeas corpus in a time of war was lawful, but military tribunals did not apply to citizens in states that had upheld the authority of the Constitution and where civilian courts were still operating.

A bill of attainder is a law by which a person is immediately convicted without trial. An ex post facto law is a law which applies retroactively, punishing someone for an act that was only made criminal after it was done. The ex post facto clause does not apply to civil matters.

Clauses 4–7: Apportionment of direct taxes.

Section Nine reiterates the provision from Section Two, Clause 3 that direct taxes must be apportioned by state populations. This clause was also explicitly shielded from constitutional amendment prior to 1808 by Article 5. In 1913, the 16th Amendment exempted all income taxes from this clause. This overcame the ruling in Pollock v Farmers' Loan & Trust Company that the income tax could only be applied to regular income and could not be applied to dividends and capital gains. Furthermore, no tax may be imposed on exports from any state. Congress may not, by revenue or commerce legislation, give preference to ports of one state over those of another; neither may it require ships from one state to pay duties in another. All funds belonging to the Treasury may not be withdrawn except according to law. Modern practice is that Congress annually passes a number of appropriations bills authorizing the expenditure of public money. The Constitution requires that a regular statement of such expenditures be published.

Clause 8: Titles of nobility.

The Title of Nobility Clause prohibits Congress from granting any title of nobility. In addition, it specifies that no civil officer may accept, without the consent of Congress, any gift, payment, office or title from a foreign ruler or state. Emoluments were a profound concern of the Founders. However, a U.S. citizen may receive foreign office before or after their period of public service.

Trump v New York was a United States Supreme Court case dealing with the 2020 United States Census. It centered on the validity of an executive memorandum written by President Donald Trump in July 2020 to the Department of Commerce, which conducts and reports the Census. The memo ordered the Department to report the results of the Census with the exclusion of the estimated counts of illegal immigrants. The memo was challenged by a coalition of U.S. states led by New York along with several cities and other organizations suing to block action on the memo. The United States District Court for the Southern District of New York found for the states and blocked enforcement of the memo, leading Trump to seek emergency action from the Supreme Court to rule on the matter before the results of the Census are due by December 31, 2020. The Court issued a per curiam decision on December 18, 2020, vacating the District Court's ruling and dismissing the case on the basis that there were matters related to lack of standing and ripeness that made the case premature. The same decision was reached by the court on December 18, 2020, for the similar "Trump v Useche" case.

While multiple states vowed to bring the case back to the Supreme Court immediately after implementation was done, thereby establishing standing and ripeness, the Trump Administration struggled immensely with implementation (due in part to the Supreme Court case Department of Commerce v New York). Ultimately, Trump's successor after the 2020 election, Joe Biden, issued Executive Order 13986 which required non-citizens to be counted in the 2020 census, both for the purposes of enumeration and determining congressional apportionment, thereby reversing the Trump administration and ending the controversy.

The Congress shall have Power To regulate Commerce with foreign Nations, and among the several States, and with the Indian Tribes.

The Supreme Court has seldom restrained the use of the commerce clause for widely varying purposes. The first important decision related to the commerce clause was Gibbons v Ogden, decided by a unanimous Court in 1824. The case involved conflicting federal and state laws: Thomas Gibbons had a federal permit to navigate steamboats in the Hudson River, while the other, Aaron Ogden, had a monopoly to do the same granted by the state of New York. Ogden contended that "commerce" included only buying and selling of goods and not their transportation. Chief Justice John Marshall rejected this notion. Marshall suggested that "commerce" includes navigation of goods, and that it "must have been contemplated" by the Framers. Marshall added that Congress's power over commerce "is complete in itself, may be exercised to its utmost extent, and acknowledges no limitations other than are prescribed in the Constitution".

The expansive interpretation of the Commerce Clause was restrained during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, when a laissez-faire attitude dominated the Court. In United States v E C Knight Company (1895), the Supreme Court limited the newly enacted Sherman Antitrust Act, which had sought to break up the monopolies dominating the nation's economy. The Court ruled that Congress could not regulate the manufacture of goods, even if they were later shipped to other states. Chief Justice Melville Fuller wrote, "commerce succeeds to manufacture, and is not a part of it."

The U.S. Supreme Court sometimes ruled New Deal programs unconstitutional because they stretched the meaning of the commerce clause. In Schechter Poultry Corp. v United States, (1935) the Court unanimously struck down industrial codes regulating the slaughter of poultry, declaring that Congress could not regulate commerce relating to the poultry, which had "come to a permanent rest within the State." As Chief Justice Charles Evans Hughes put it, "so far as the poultry here in question is concerned, the flow of interstate commerce has ceased." Judicial rulings against attempted use of Congress's Commerce Clause powers continued during the 1930s.

The Senators and Representatives shall receive a Compensation for their Services, to be ascertained by Law, and paid out of the Treasury of the United States. They shall in all Cases, except Treason, Felony and Breach of the Peace, be privileged from Arrest during their Attendance at the Session of their respective Houses, and in going to and returning from the same; and for any Speech or Debate in either House, they shall not be questioned in any other Place.

Senators and representatives set their own compensation. Under the Twenty-seventh Amendment, any change in their compensation will not take effect until after the next congressional election. Paying senators and representatives out of the federal treasury was a departure from the practice under the Articles of Confederation, where they were paid by the state in which they were elected.

Members of both houses have certain privileges, based on those enjoyed by the members of the British Parliament. Members attending, going to or returning from either house are privileged from arrest, except for treason, felony or breach of the peace. One may not sue a senator or representative for slander occurring during Congressional debate, nor may speech by a member of Congress during a Congressional session be the basis for criminal prosecution. The latter was affirmed when Mike Gravel published over 4,000 pages of the Pentagon Papers in the Congressional Record, which might have otherwise been a criminal offense. This clause has also been interpreted in Gravel v United States, (1972) to provide protection to aides and staff of sitting members of Congress, so long as their activities relate to legislative matters.

Clause 2: Independence from the executive.

No Senator or Representative shall, during the Time for which he was elected, be appointed to any civil Office under the Authority of the United States, which shall have been created, or the Emoluments whereof shall have been increased during such time; and no Person holding any Office under the United States, shall be a Member of either House during his Continuance in Office.

Senators and representatives may not simultaneously serve in Congress and hold a position in the executive branch. This restriction is meant to protect legislative independence by preventing the president from using patronage to buy votes in Congress. It is a major difference from the political system in the British Parliament, where cabinet ministers are required to be members of parliament.

Furthermore, senators and representatives cannot resign to take newly created or higher-paying political positions; rather, they must wait until the conclusion of the term for which they were elected. If Congress increases the salary of a particular officer, it may later reduce that salary to permit an individual to resign from Congress and take that position (known as the Saxbe fix). The effects of the clause were discussed in 1937, when Senator Hugo Black was appointed an associate justice of the Supreme Court with some time left in his Senate term. Just prior to the appointment, Congress had increased the pension available to Justices retiring at the age of seventy. It was therefore suggested by some that the office's emolument had been increased during Black's senatorial term, and that therefore Black could not take office as a justice. The response, however, was that Black was fifty-one years old, and would not receive the increased pension until at least 19 years later, long after his Senate term had expired.

Salinas v Railroad Retirement Board (2021) was a United States Supreme Court case in which the court held that the United States Railroad Retirement Board choice to refuse to reopen the prior, adverse benefits determination of a former railroad worker was subject to judicial review.

Facts and procedural history.

Manfredo M. Salinas was an employee of the Union Pacific Railroad for a fifteen-year period and was injured twice while working. In 1992, due to his injuries, Salinas began the process of seeking disability benefits provided under the Railroad Retirement Act of 1974. His application was denied three times, the final denial occurring in 2006. Salinas was granted benefits after a fourth application in 2013. After the board granted Salinas benefits, he appealed for reconsideration of the "amount and start date" of the benefits.

This reconsideration was denied. In response, Salinas appealed, arguing that the final denied application should be reopened, as the Railroad Retirement Board had not been given access to pertinent medical records in 2006. A Board hearing officer determined that the 2006 application could not be reopened as the Board’s standard four-year window for reopening had closed. After this determination, Salinas asked the U.S. Court of Appeals to review the decision. The Fifth Circuit dismissed Salinas’ petition, citing lack of jurisdiction.

Federal Republic of Germany v Philipp was a United States Supreme Court case that dealt with the applicability of the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act (FSIA) for heirs of victims of the Holocaust to sue Germany in the United States court systems for compensation for items that were taken by the Nazi Party during World War II. At issue in the case was whether claims fell within the FSIA’s exception to sovereign immunity for “property taken in violation of international law,” given that the sovereign here was alleged to have engaged in a taking of its own nationals’ property; and whether courts can invoke the doctrine of international comity under the FSIA to abstain from exercising jurisdiction based on prudential considerations. In an unanimous opinion by Chief Justice Roberts, the Court held that FSIA does not allow these survivors to sue Germany in U.S. court, as the sale was an act of expropriation of property rather than an act of genocide, though other means of recovery are still potentially available.

The decision also concluded a related case, Republic of Hungary v Simon, which examined the application of the doctrines of international comity and forum non conveniens for expropriation exception cases brought under the FSIA. The Court decided the case per curiam on the ruling of Germany v Philipp on February 3, 2021.

Background.

During World War II, the Nazi Party imprisoned numerous people, including a large number of Jewish people, and stripped them of their possessions. In other cases, the Nazi rule forced these people to sell their possessions at significantly reduced prices. At the center of the current case is the Guelph Treasure with an estimated value of US$250 million in 2020. The items were purchased by a consortium of Jewish art dealers prior to the war, but they were then forced to sell the collection at a third of its value in 1935 to agents of Hermann Göring. After the war, the Guelph Treasure pieces were moved to the Kunstgewerbemuseum Berlin (Museum of Decorative Arts) which is overseen by the Federal Republic of Germany under the Prussian Cultural Heritage Foundation, where they have remained as part of the exhibits.

Clause 6: Trial of impeachment.

The Senate shall have the sole Power to try all Impeachments. When sitting for that Purpose, they shall be on Oath or Affirmation. When the President of the United States is tried, the Chief Justice shall preside: And no Person shall be convicted without the Concurrence of two thirds of the Members present.

Clause Six grants to the Senate the sole power to try impeachments and spells out the basic procedures for impeachment trials. The Supreme Court has interpreted this clause to mean that the Senate has exclusive and unreviewable authority to determine what constitutes an adequate impeachment trial. Of the nineteen federal officials formally impeached by the House of Representatives, four resigned (so that proceedings were dismissed), seven were acquitted, and eight (all judges) were convicted by the Senate.

On another occasion, the Senate declined to proceed with the impeachment of Senator William Blount in 1797, asserting that the House had no jurisdiction over members of the Senate; in any case, Blount had already been expelled from the Senate.

The constitution's framers vested the Senate with this power for several reasons. First, they believed senators would be better educated, more virtuous, and more high-minded than members of the House of Representatives and thus uniquely able to decide responsibly the most difficult of political questions. Second, they believed that the Senate, being a numerous body, would be well suited to handle the procedural demands of an impeachment trial, in which it, unlike judges and the judiciary system, would "never be tied down by such strict rules, either in the delineation of the offense by the prosecutor, or in the construction of it by judges, as in the common cases serve to limit the discretion of courts in favor of personal security." (Alexander Hamilton, The Federalist No. 65).

There are three Constitutionally mandated requirements for impeachment trials. The provision that senators must sit on oath or affirmation was designed to impress upon them the extreme seriousness of the occasion. The stipulation that the Chief Justice is to preside over presidential impeachment trials underscores the solemnity of the occasion, and aims to avoid the conflict of interest of a vice president presiding over the proceeding for the removal of the one official standing between them and the presidency. The latter consideration was regarded to be quite important in the eighteenth century - political parties had not yet formed when the Constitution was adopted, and with the original method of electing the president and vice president it was presumed that the two people elected to those offices would frequently be political rivals. The specification that a two-thirds supermajority vote of those senators present in order to convict was also thought necessary to facilitate serious deliberation and to make removal possible only through a consensus that cuts across factional divisions.

Pereida v Wilkinson, (2021), was a United States Supreme Court (the Court) case in which the Court ruled that under the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA) an alien seeking to cancel a lawful removal order bears the burden of showing that he has not been convicted of a disqualifying offense. An alien has not carried that burden when the record shows he has been convicted under a statute limiting multiple offenses, some of which are disqualifying, and the record is ambiguous as to which crime formed the basis of his conviction.

Background.

Under the INA, certain nonpermanent residents may seek to cancel an order of removal and adjust to the status of an alien lawfully admitted for permanent residence by applying to the United States Attorney General through the Executive Office for Immigration Review (EOIR), a subagency of the United States Department of Justice. As part of their application, the alien must demonstrate that they (1) have been physically present in the United States for a continuous period of not less than 10 years immediately preceding the application, (2) have been a person of good moral character during such period, (3) have not been convicted of an offense that would either render them inadmissible to be admitted to the United States or deportable from the United States, and (4) establishes that removal would result in exceptional and extremely unusual hardship to the alien's qualifying relative who is a United States citizen or lawful permanent resident.

Clemente Avelino Pereida was a citizen of Mexico who entered the United States without authorization or inspection in approximately 1995. He relocated to Nebraska with his family, was gainfully employed and paid taxes, and with his wife raised three children, one a U.S. citizen and another a Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals recipient. After an arrest, he was identified as an unlawfully present alien, and placed into removal proceedings in 2009. He did not contest his removability but instead applied to cancel his removal and adjust status to a lawful permanent resident. To demonstrate the requirements for cancellation of removal meant he had to produce records of his criminal history. But given his recent arrest, he was progressing through immigration proceedings in tandem with his criminal case.

In his criminal case, state authorities charged him with attempted criminal impersonation for using a false Social Security card to seek employment at National Service Company of Iowa. The Nebraska Statute section 28-608 (2008) charged four different means in which a person could violate attempted criminal impersonation. Pereida was found guilty under the statute, he paid a fine and served no jail time for the offense.

While Pereida identified his conviction for his cancellation of removal application, he declined to offer any evidence of his conviction. The United States Department of Homeland Security produced his criminal complaint but that document did not specify which of the four means he actually violated. That was problematic because three of the means were disqualifying offenses as a crime involving moral turpitude (CIMT) that rendered him inadmissible or deportable while one (carrying a business without a license) did not. Pereida argued that such ambiguity meant that his prior conviction could not be construed as a disqualifying offense to bar eligibility for relief. The EOIR Immigration Judge presiding over his case determined that Pereida's attempted criminal impersonation conviction was a CIMT that disqualified him from cancellation of removal and ordered him removed from the United States.

Clause 3: Apportionment of Representatives and taxes.

Representatives and direct Taxes shall be apportioned among the several States which may be included within this Union, according to their respective Numbers, which shall be determined by adding to the whole Number of free Persons, including those bound to Service for a Term of Years, and excluding Indians not taxed, three fifths of all other Persons. The actual Enumeration shall be made within three Years after the first Meeting of the Congress of the United States, and within every subsequent Term of ten Years, in such Manner as they shall by Law direct. The number of Representatives shall not exceed one for every thirty Thousand, but each State shall have at Least one Representative; and until such enumeration shall be made, the State of New Hampshire shall be entitled to choose three, Massachusetts eight, Rhode-Island and Providence Plantations one, Connecticut five, New-York six, New Jersey four, Pennsylvania eight, Delaware one, Maryland six, Virginia ten, North Carolina five, South Carolina five, and Georgia three.

After much debate, the framers of the Constitution decided to make population the basis of apportioning the seats in the House of Representatives and the tax liability among the states. To facilitate this, the Constitution mandates that a census be conducted every ten years to determine the population of each state and of the nation as a whole and establishes a rule for who shall be counted or excluded from the count. As the new form of government would become operational prior to the completion of a national census, the Constitution also provides for a temporary apportionment of seats.

Originally, the population of each state and of the nation as a whole was ascertained by adding to the whole number of free Persons, three-fifths the number of all other Persons (for example, slaves), but excluding non-taxed Native Americans. This Constitutional rule, known as the three-fifths compromise, was a compromise between Southern and Northern states in which three-fifths of the population of slaves would be counted for enumeration purposes and for the apportionment of seats in the House of Representatives and of taxes among the states. It was, according to Supreme Court Justice Joseph Story (writing in 1833), a "matter of compromise and concession, confessedly unequal in its operation, but a necessary sacrifice to that spirit of conciliation, which was indispensable to the union of states having a great diversity of interests, and phyal condition, and political institutions". Section 2 of the Fourteenth Amendment (1868) later superseded Article 1, Section 2, Clause 3 and explicitly repealed the compromise.

Following the completion of each census, Congress is empowered to use the aggregate population in all the states (according to the prevailing Constitutional rule for determining population) to determine the relative population of each state to the population of the whole, and, based on its calculations, to establish the appropriate size of the House and to allocate a particular number of representatives to each state according to its share of the national population.

Article One of the United States Constitution establishes the legislative branch of the federal government, the United States Congress. Under Article One, Congress is a bicameral legislature consisting of the House of Representatives and the Senate. Article One grants Congress various enumerated powers and the ability to pass laws "necessary and proper" to carry out those powers. Article One also establishes the procedures for passing a bill and places various limits on the powers of Congress and the states from abusing their powers.

Article One Vesting Clause grants all federal legislative power to Congress and establishes that Congress consists of the House of Representatives and the Senate. In combination with the Vesting Clauses of Article Two and Article Three, the Vesting Clause of Article One establishes the separation of powers among the three branches of the federal government. Section 2 of Article One addresses the House of Representatives, establishing that members of the House are elected every two years, with congressional seats apportioned to the states on the basis of population. Section 2 includes various rules for the House of Representatives, including a provision stating that individuals qualified to vote in elections for the largest chamber of their state's legislature have the right to vote in elections for the House of Representatives. Section 3 addresses the Senate, establishing that the Senate consists of two senators from each state, with each senator serving a six-year term. Section 3 originally required that the state legislatures elect the members of the Senate, but the Seventeenth Amendment, ratified in 1913, provides for the direct election of senators. Section 3 lays out various other rules for the Senate, including a provision that establishes the vice president of the United States as the president of the Senate.

Section 4 of Article One grants the states the power to regulate the congressional election process but establishes that Congress can alter those regulations or make its own regulations. Section 4 also requires Congress to assemble at least once per year. Section 5 lays out various rules for both houses of Congress and grants the House of Representatives and the Senate the power to judge their own elections, determine the qualifications of their own members, and punish or expel their own members. Section 6 establishes the compensation, privileges, and restrictions of those holding congressional office. Section 7 lays out the procedures for passing a bill, requiring both houses of Congress to pass a bill for it to become law, subject to the veto power of the president of the United States. Under Section 7, the president can veto a bill, but Congress can override the president's veto with a two-thirds vote of both chambers.

Uzuegbunam v Preczewski, is a decision by the Supreme Court of the United States, dealing with nominal damages to be awarded to individuals whose right to freedom of speech has been suppressed by an entity but subsequently rendered moot due to intervening circumstances. In an 8–1 decision, the Court held that such nominal damages satisfy the Article Three requirement of redressability, when awarded for a past violation of a legal right.

Clarence Thomas wrote for the majority that Uzuegbunam's inability to quantify his damages in economic terms did not bar him from demanding nominal damages. Chief Justice John Roberts, dissenting alone for the only time so far in his tenure on the Court, argued that the majority had opened up the federal courts to litigation by anyone willing to claim so much as one dollar in nominal damages.

Background.

Chike Uzuegbunam was a student at Georgia Gwinnett College in Lawrenceville, Georgia. While at school, he adopted Christianity, and attempted to proselytize on campus. He was stopped by campus security and told that religious recruitment or proselytizing was limited to certain designated "speech zones" on campus, for use of which he was required to register ahead of time. Uzuegbunam followed the procedure to register a block of time at one of these zones, but due to a student complaint his activities were determined to be violating the policy that disallows speech that "disturbs the peace and/or comfort" of the students or faculty. Uzuegbunam made no further attempts to proselytize, and eventually graduated from the college.

The Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF) filed a lawsuit against the school on behalf of Uzuegbunam in the United States District Court for the Northern District of Georgia in December 2016. Shortly after the filing of the suit, the college changed its policies on its speech zones, which rendered Uzuegbunam's claims moot, since the activities he had attempted to pursue were no longer regulated and, in any event, he had since graduated and was no longer associated with the college. ADF countered with an assertion that the college should still be liable for nominal damages as it had violated Uzuegbunam's rights at some point in the past. Such nominal damages, typically a single dollar, are generally assigned to assert that wrongdoing had occurred as part of case law.

While the case was being heard in District Court, its appellate court, the Eleventh Circuit, ruled in Flanigan's Enters., Inc v City of Sandy Springs that "a claim for nominal damages in a constitutional violation case when the conduct is not likely to reoccur is moot". The District Court applied the Eleventh's Flanigan's ruling to Uzuegbunam's ruling and declared that the request for nominal damages was moot. The appeal of Uzuegbunam's case to the Eleventh Circuit upheld the mootness decision.

The Eleventh Circuit court's ruling in Flanigan's had furthered a split in the Circuit courts on the matter of nominal damages resulting from constitutional violations declared moot. In the 2nd, 4th, 5th, 6th, 8th, 9th and 10th Circuits, prior case law has deemed that even in the case of a moot violation, nominal damages are sufficient to keep a case alive. Legal experts had expected Flanigan's to be taken by the Supreme Court to resolve the circuit split, but the petition was rejected in 2018.