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The Constitution names certain rights, such as speech, religion, assembly, etc., which are protected.

The ninth amendment makes it clear that other rights that are not named are also protected. These include the rights to marry, have children, own property, work, make contracts, and travel.

The spirit of this amendment is often ignored when people point to the enumerated rights as more sacred than rights that are not named. If you look at the history of the bill of rights, the enumerated rights (along with habeus corpus) are the rights that the U.K. most often violated, leading up to the American Revolution.

This amendment was thought necessary when the bill of rights was ratified. It has never been much practical use. For example, there was no right to vote in the original constitution. Most states limited the franchise to white male property owners over the age of 21. A few over the years allowed women or other groups to vote.

The Supreme Court ignored the ninth and tenth amendments starting after the 1930s and has upheld practically every action of the federal government by using the commerce clause or later amendments.

- Jim