On what date were the first ten amendments to the United States Constitution ratified?

The first ten amendments to the United States Constitution were ratified on December 15, 1791.

They are known collectively as the United States Bill of Rights. James Madison introduced a set of proposed amendments in the First Congress partly in response to Anti-Federalist objections raised during the Constitution’s ratification debates. Congress approved twelve articles on September 25, 1789, and sent them to the states.

The states ratified Articles Three through Twelve, which became Amendments One through Ten, on December 15, 1791. The original proposed Article Two was eventually ratified as the Twenty-seventh Amendment in 1992, while the original Article One remains unratified. This explains why twelve proposals produced a ten-amendment Bill of Rights.

The amendments protect freedoms including speech, religion, press, assembly, and petition, while also addressing searches, criminal procedure, due process, and the relationship between federal and state powers. The Bill of Rights was added to the Constitution as supplemental amendments rather than inserted into the original text.