the source of authority cited by the supreme court for applying the bill of rights to the states
Incorporation of the Bill of Rights Incorporation, in U.S. law, is the process by which American courts have applied portions of the U.S. Bill of Rights to the states. When it was first ratified, the Bill of Rights only protected the rights it enumerated from federal infringement, but it had no authority over state and local governments. However, in the post-Civil War era, beginning in 1897 with Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Railroad v. City of Chicago, various portions have been held to be incorporated against state and local government through the Fourteenth Amendment.
United States Bill of Rights The Bill of Rights is the first ten amendments to the United States Constitution.[1] Proposed following the often bitter 1787â€“88 battle over ratification of the U.S. Constitution, and crafted to address the objections raised by Anti-Federalists, the Bill of Rights amendments add to the Constitution specific guarantees of personal freedoms and rights, clear limitations on the government's power in judicial and other proceedings, and explicit declarations that all powers not specifically delegated to Congress by the Constitution are reserved for the states or the people. The concepts codified in these amendments are built upon those found in several earlier documents, including the Virginia Declaration of Rights and the English Bill of Rights, along with earlier documents such as Magna Carta (1215). In practice, the amendments had little impact on judgments by the courts for the first 150 years after ratification.[citation needed]