On 4/6/2012 2:07 PM, Warp wrote:
>    Could someone explain to me in plain terms what the 9th amendment to the
> United States constitution means?
>
>    Wikipedia has a wall of text about it, but it's a bit difficult to
> understand the gist of it.

Our constitution mentions a number of rights.  The Ninth Amendment in 
theory means that a right cannot be denied merely because it is not 
mentioned.

For instance, let us say that a local government decided to ban 
gambling.  In the course of events someone will eventually be caught 
breaking the law and be brought to trial.  The defendant can argue that 
the law is a violation of his rights.  What the ninth amendment does is 
state that the prosecutor cannot rebut this argument by stating that 
since such a right is not listed in the Constitution, it therefore does 
not exist.  he may be able to establish that it is not a right by some 
other vein logic, but he cannot rest his case on the fact that such a 
right is not mentioned in the Constitution.

This also does not establish that gambling is a right, but only that the 
lack of mention does not prove that it is not a right.

That's the theory.

In practice, the Ninth Amendment means whatever the Supreme Court says 
it means.  Just like the rest of the Constitution.

John
(who has been away a while and is catching up on old posts.)

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