Bill of rights

This article is about the concept. For specific bills of rights, see United States Bill of Rights, English Bill of Rights, and § List of bills of rights. For other uses, see Bill of Rights (disambiguation).
"Charter of rights" redirects here. For the Canadian constitutional charter, see Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.
The Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen of 1789 is a fundamental document of the French Revolution and in the history of human rights.
Draft of the United States Bill of Rights, also from 1789

A bill of rights, sometimes called a declaration of rights or a charter of rights, is a list of the most important rights to the citizens of a country. The purpose is to protect those rights against infringement from public officials and private citizens.[1]

Bills of rights may be entrenched or unentrenched. An entrenched bill of rights cannot be amended or repealed by a country's legislature through regular procedure, instead requiring a supermajority or referendum; often it is part of a country's constitution, and therefore subject to special procedures applicable to constitutional amendments.

  1. ^ Sellers, Mortimer N. S. (2013). "Universal Human Rights Law in the United States". In Haeck, Yves; Brems, Eva (eds.). Human Rights and Civil Liberties in the 21st Century. Ius Gentium: Comparative Perspectives on Law and Justice. Vol. 30. Dordrecht: Springer Netherlands. pp. 15–35. doi:10.1007/978-94-007-7599-2_2. ISBN 978-94-007-7598-5.