Bill of Rights Trivia
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This Bill of Rights trivia quiz has 110 free questions with answers and covers the first ten amendments the way a good civics teacher would: what each one actually says (and which freedom the First Amendment lists first), where the ideas came from (Magna Carta, the English Bill of Rights, George Mason's Virginia Declaration), and the fight to get them passed, from Madison's about-face and his campaign against James Monroe to the fistfight at the Massachusetts convention. It also follows the amendments into the courtroom: Miranda, Gideon's pencilled petition, the armbands in Tinker, Heller and the Second Amendment, the only real Third Amendment case, and the congressional pay amendment that a Texas student rescued from a C grade and got ratified 202 years late. The early questions suit a middle-school or high-school civics class or a Constitution Day round; the later ones will test law students and history buffs. Every answer has been checked against Wikipedia and the text of the amendments themselves, and each question shows its citation once you have answered.
30 of 110 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01The US Bill of Rights consists of how many amendments to the Constitution?
Ten
Congress actually sent twelve articles to the states in 1789; the last ten were ratified as the Bill of Rights.
Q 02Which representative drafted the Bill of Rights and steered it through the First Congress?
James Madison
Historian Gordon Wood wrote that there might have been a Constitution without him, but certainly no Bill of Rights.
Q 03Bill of Rights Day is observed each year on which date, the anniversary of the 1791 ratification?
December 15
Franklin Roosevelt declared the day in 1941 for the 150th anniversary; one state's vote that day pushed the amendments over the three-quarters line.
Q 04The Bill of Rights answered objections raised by which group during the ratification debates?
The Anti-Federalists
Patrick Henry, Samuel Adams and Richard Henry Lee were among the leaders who feared a strong national government would trample individual rights.
Q 05Which founder wrote to Madison urging a bill of rights: 'Half a loaf is better than no bread'?
Thomas Jefferson
Jefferson was serving as minister to France during the whole debate and never attended the Constitutional Convention.
Q 06Who first suggested a bill of rights at the 1787 Philadelphia Convention, only to see it defeated unanimously?
George Mason of Virginia
Gerry made the formal motion; Sherman argued state bills of rights were protection enough, and every state delegation voted no.
Q 07Which 1776 document, drafted by George Mason, was the greatest single influence on Madison's text?
The Virginia Declaration of Rights
Madison also drew on Magna Carta for jury trial and petition rights and on the English Bill of Rights for arms and cruel punishment.
Q 08Who persuaded the House to tack the amendments on at the end of the Constitution rather than weave them in?
Roger Sherman
Sherman argued the original document should 'remain inviolate', which is why amendments are numbered codicils rather than edits.
Q 09Madison ran for the First Congress against which future president, in a district gerrymandered by Patrick Henry?
James Monroe
He won by pledging to introduce a bill of rights, a promise he kept in June 1789.
Q 10Why did Hamilton argue in Federalist No. 84 that a separate list of guaranteed liberties was unnecessary?
The Constitution already served that purpose
He warned that listing rights might imply any right left off the list did not exist, an argument later answered by the Ninth Amendment.
Q 11How many amendments had the House sent to the Senate in August 1789, before the Senate condensed the list?
Seventeen
Madison had started with nine proposals; the Senate cut the seventeen to twelve, and ten passed the states at the time.
Q 12The original Article Two of the 1789 amendments was ratified in 1992 as which amendment?
The Twenty-seventh
It stops any congressional pay change from taking effect until after the next election, and waited more than 202 years.
Q 13What grade did Gregory Watson get on the paper that led to the 1992 congressional pay amendment?
A C
The university formally changed the grade to an A+ in 2017, 35 years later.
Q 21The Third Amendment forbids the government from doing what in peacetime without the owner's consent?
Quartering soldiers in a house
It answered the British Quartering Acts and has never been the main basis of a Supreme Court decision.
Q 22The Third Amendment case Engblom v. Carey (1982) arose when New York housed Guard troops where?
In striking prison guards' dorms
The court held that guardsmen count as soldiers under the amendment and that it applies to the states.
Q 23The Fourth Amendment requires warrants to be supported by what?
Probable cause
Q 14The original Article One of the twelve 1789 amendments, never ratified, dealt with what?
The size of the House of Representatives
It came within one state of ratification twice before 1803; with 50 states it would need 27 more to ratify.
Q 15Which First Amendment freedom is listed first in its text?
Religion
The order is establishment of religion, free exercise, speech, press, assembly and petition.
Q 16How many separate freedoms does the First Amendment protect?
Five
Religion, speech, press, assembly and petition; courts have added an implied freedom of association.
Q 17Which founder's correspondence gave the Supreme Court the phrase 'a wall of separation between church and State'?
Thomas Jefferson
The words are not in the First Amendment itself; the Court borrowed them in Everson v. Board of Education.
Q 18Which 1969 Supreme Court case upheld students' right to wear black armbands in protest?
Tinker v. Des Moines
Its 'substantial disruption' test is still used to judge school speech cases.
Q 19The Second Amendment opens with a clause about the necessity of what?
A well regulated Militia
The right to keep and bear arms had earlier been written into the English Bill of Rights of 1689, though there it applied only to Protestants.
Q 20Which 2008 Supreme Court case held the Second Amendment protects an individual right to bear arms?
District of Columbia v. Heller
McDonald v. Chicago extended the same limit to state and local governments two years later.
It was a reaction to the British writ of assistance, a general search warrant that let officers rummage at will.
Q 24The Fourth Amendment is the basis for which doctrine barring illegally obtained evidence from trials?
The exclusionary rule
Mapp v. Ohio applied it to the states in 1961 after Cleveland police waved a fake warrant at Dollree Mapp.
Q 25'Taking the Fifth' refers to which protection in the Fifth Amendment?
Against self-incrimination
The same amendment also guarantees due process and bans trying someone twice for the same offence.
Q 26Which 1966 case requires police to tell suspects of their rights before interrogation?
Miranda v. Arizona
Ernesto Miranda confessed after two hours of questioning without ever being told he could have a lawyer.
Q 27Under the Fifth Amendment, private property may be taken for public use only with what?
Just compensation
This is the constitutional basis of eminent domain.
Q 28The Sixth Amendment guarantees a criminal defendant a trial that is what?
Speedy and public
It also promises an impartial jury, notice of the charges, confrontation of witnesses and the assistance of counsel.
Q 29How was the petition that began Gideon v. Wainwright (1963) written?
In pencil on prison stationery
Clarence Gideon had been convicted of burgling a Panama City pool room after a judge refused to appoint him counsel.
Q 30The Seventh Amendment guarantees a civil jury trial when the value in dispute exceeds what amount?
Twenty dollars
The figure has never been updated for inflation, and this is one of the few amendments never applied to the states.