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< I went hunting for the 14th Amendment, the document that could bar Trump from ballots

February 7, 20245:33 AM ET

I went hunting for the 14th Amendment, the document that could bar Trump from ballots

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SACHA PFEIFFER, HOST:

Should former President Donald Trump be disqualified from Colorado's primary ballot? On Thursday, the Supreme Court is set to hear arguments on that question based on the 14th Amendment of the Constitution. NPR's Luke Garrett got an exclusive and up-close look at the Civil War-era document at the center of this case.

(SOUNDBITE OF PAGES TURNING)

LUKE GARRETT, BYLINE: The original 14th Amendment is bound in a red leather book the size of a pizza box.

JANE FITZGERALD: Within this same volume are public laws from the 39th Congress.

GARRETT: That's Jane Fitzgerald, senior archivist at the National Archives. She says unlike its older cousin, the Bill of Rights, the 14th Amendment isn't stored in the rotunda at the National Archives. It hasn't been on display for over a decade. Back in 2013, it was briefly on display before it was cycled out of an exhibit. Since then, it's been stored in a protective box in a cold room inside the research wing of the archives. But once in a while, it sees the light of day.

(SOUNDBITE OF PAGES TURNING)

GARRETT: And after much careful and persistent flipping, we finally arrived at the original document.

MORGAN BROWNING: The pages are parchment, which is derived from animal skin.

GARRETT: That's Morgan Browning, senior conservator at the National Archives.

BROWNING: The 14th Amendment is on two pages, and it consists of iron gall ink text.

GARRETT: The cursive strokes of thin, black ink on parchment send your eyes on a roller coaster ride back in time. So I read parts of Section 3 slowly.

(Reading) No person shall hold any office who, having previously taken an oath to support the Constitution of the United States, shall have engaged in insurrection.

For Browning, this document is alive.

BROWNING: All the documents in this building, to some extent, are living documents because they are accessed by the public.

GARRETT: But the 14th Amendment is delicate and fragile, susceptible to the slightest change in light, temperature and humidity, something Browning kept his eye on during the entire visit.

BROWNING: The parchment absorbs the humidity.

GARRETT: After only a few minutes in the room with a few people and some big windows, the 14th Amendment started to react to its new environment.

BROWNING: So this is curling up.

GARRETT: That's Browning noting that the corners of the parchment were starting to turn upwards.

BROWNING: Can I just run down to the lab super quickly just to get a little strap?

GARRETT: Instead of going through all that trouble, we decided to say goodbye to this founding document.

BROWNING: Well, it's always a thrill. I mean, it never gets, you know, boring in any way, shape or form.

GARRETT: With the 14th Amendment heading back to storage, the ideas and laws it enshrines are now up for review at the Supreme Court.

Inside the National Archives, Luke Garrett, NPR News, Washington.

(SOUNDBITE OF HIT-BOY AND RHAPSODY SONG, "ASTEROIDS")

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