The 14th Amendment was written in the first half of 1866. A joint congressional committee drafted it between January and April of that year, the House and Senate passed the final text on June 13, 1866, and the states completed ratification on July 9, 1868. Secretary of State William Seward officially certified it as part of the Constitution on July 28, 1868. So the question of when the 14th Amendment was written has two useful answers: the drafting happened in early 1866, and the full journey from first draft to ratified constitutional text took roughly two and a half years.
The Committee That Drafted It
The work began in a body Congress created specifically for the task. On December 4, 1865, Representative Thaddeus Stevens of Pennsylvania introduced a resolution to form a Joint Committee on Reconstruction, and the House approved it the same day by a vote of 133 to 36. The committee was formally established on December 13, 1865, with nine House members and six senators, twelve Republicans and three Democrats, chaired by Senator William Pitt Fessenden of Maine.1U.S. Senate. Joint Committee of Fifteen on Reconstruction
Its job was to investigate conditions in the former Confederacy and decide what legal protections newly freed people needed. After months of testimony, the committee concluded that the southern states were “disorganized communities” lacking legitimate civil governments. That finding pushed the response toward a constitutional amendment rather than ordinary legislation. The committee wanted protections that no future Congress or state government could easily undo.
Who Wrote the Text
Throughout the first months of 1866, the committee worked through multiple drafts. Some versions focused on voting rights; others tried to reduce congressional representation for states that blocked Black men from voting. The challenge was fitting all of these goals into a single amendment that could win a two-thirds vote in both chambers of Congress.
Two figures shaped the text more than anyone else. Representative John Bingham of Ohio served as the primary author of Section 1, which established birthright citizenship and guaranteed due process and equal protection.2National Archives. 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution: Civil Rights Bingham intended his language to make the Bill of Rights binding on state governments, closing a gap that had existed since the founding. His words also directly overturned the Supreme Court’s 1857 Dred Scott decision, which had ruled that Black Americans could not be citizens.3National Archives. Dred Scott v Sandford
Thaddeus Stevens, the leader of the Radical Republicans in the House, drove the political strategy. When he introduced the amendment on the House floor on May 8, 1866, he acknowledged it might not achieve “full justice” immediately but argued that practical progress was better than demanding everything and getting nothing. Stevens framed the work as correcting the failures of the founders, who had been “compelled to postpone the principles of their great Declaration” by tolerating slavery.4Constitution Center. Speech Introducing the Fourteenth Amendment
By April 1866, the committee had settled on a comprehensive text combining citizenship protections, representation penalties, a ban on former rebels holding office, provisions addressing war debts, and a grant of enforcement power to Congress.
Congressional Passage in 1866
Once the committee finalized its proposal, both chambers moved through the amendment in about five weeks. The House voted first, passing the resolution on May 10, 1866, by a margin of 128 to 37. The Senate then took up the text, made changes to clarify the citizenship clause, and passed its revised version on June 8, 1866, by 33 to 11.5Library of Congress. 14th Amendment to the US Constitution: Primary Documents in American History
Because the Senate had modified the language, the House needed to vote again on the revised text. On June 13, 1866, the House approved the Senate’s version 120 to 32, clearing the two-thirds threshold required to send a constitutional amendment to the states.5Library of Congress. 14th Amendment to the US Constitution: Primary Documents in American History On June 22, President Andrew Johnson sent a message to Congress confirming the amendment had been transmitted to the states.
What the Written Amendment Contained
The finished text has five sections. Section 1 established birthright citizenship and barred states from denying due process or equal protection.6Constitution Annotated. Fourteenth Amendment Equal Protection and Other Rights Section 2 reduced a state’s congressional representation proportionally if it denied the vote to eligible male citizens.7Constitution Annotated. Overview of Apportionment of Representation Section 3 disqualified former government officials who had joined the rebellion from holding office, subject to a two-thirds congressional override.8Congress.gov. Fourteenth Amendment Section 3 Disqualification from Holding Office Section 4 guaranteed federal debts and voided Confederate debts and claims for compensation over emancipation.9Constitution Annotated. Overview of Public Debt Clause Section 5 gave Congress power to enforce the amendment through legislation.10Constitution Annotated. Fourteenth Amendment Section 5
Ratification by the States
Ratification required approval from three-fourths of the states, or 28 out of 37 at the time.2National Archives. 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution: Civil Rights Northern and western states began ratifying almost immediately, but most former Confederate states rejected the amendment outright. Their refusal triggered a sharp escalation. Congress passed the Reconstruction Acts of 1867, which divided the former Confederacy into five military districts and required each state to ratify the 14th Amendment as a condition for regaining representation in Congress.11United States Senate. The Civil War: The Senates Story
The story then got messier. As former Confederate states were compelled to ratify, two northern states, New Jersey and Ohio, tried to take their ratifications back. Oregon, which had ratified in September 1866, later rescinded its approval in October 1868.12U.S. Government Publishing Office. Constitution, Jeffersons Manual, and the Rules of the House of Representatives The Constitution did not answer whether a state could withdraw a ratification.
Congress decided the answer was no. It treated the rescissions as legally meaningless and counted New Jersey and Ohio among the ratifying states.13Congress.gov. Effect of Prior Rejection of an Amendment or Rescission of Ratification That position has never been overturned by a court.
Certification on July 28, 1868
South Carolina’s ratification vote on July 9, 1868, pushed the total to 28, meeting the three-fourths threshold. Getting from that vote to official recognition took another nineteen days.
Secretary of State William Seward issued a preliminary proclamation on July 20, 1868, but hedged. Noting that Ohio and New Jersey had attempted to withdraw, Seward said the amendment was ratified only “if” those rescissions were ineffective. The next day, July 21, Congress adopted a concurrent resolution declaring flatly that the required number of states had ratified and that the amendment “is hereby declared to be a part of the Constitution.”12U.S. Government Publishing Office. Constitution, Jeffersons Manual, and the Rules of the House of Representatives
With Congress having removed any ambiguity, Seward issued his final, unconditional certification on July 28, 1868, officially declaring the 14th Amendment part of the supreme law of the land.2National Archives. 14th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution: Civil Rights The document confirmed that 28 of 37 states had approved the text, ending a process that had stretched over two years from the first House vote.