B.2(ah). Unenumerated Rights

The absence of a Right in this list does not deny its existence unless expressly reserved for Citizens.

This is modeled after the Ninth Amendment, although it differs in scope.[1] Legally, it isn’t extremely useful because the debate remains open whether this or that is one of those rights (although it does exclude a few, by limiting civil rights to those not reserved for citizens). But that’s the point. It opens that debate. It acknowledges that no list of enumerated rights can ever be comprehensive. That’s for two reasons. First, it is practically impossible for any person or assembly of people to think of every possible right that should be considered. Secondly, it makes sure we, as a generation, remain humble. We can’t know what rights will need to exist twenty, fifty, a hundred years from now. The framers of the Constitution of 1789 couldn’t even dream of the need for access to the digital sphere. How could they have enshrined that right? We, too, have no idea what the needs of the future will be. By explicitly acknowledging that other rights aren’t precluded, we leave philosophical room for that future debate.

The rights debate has raged in our nation for centuries. We haven’t agreed on what they are. Still, we all agree that they exist, in part because the ninth amendment tells us that they do.

---

[1] U.S. Const. amend. IX.