Article Four of the United States Constitution

Article Four of the United States Constitution outlines the relationship between the various states, as well as the relationship between each state and the United States federal government.

Articles Four, Five and Six embody concepts of federalism, describing the rights and responsibilities of state governments, the states in relationship to the federal government, and the shared process of constitutional amendment.

The Full Faith and Credit Clause requires states to extend "full faith and credit" to the public acts, records and court proceedings of other states.

Article IV, Section 1 of the United States Constitution, the Full Faith and Credit Clause, addresses the duties that states within the United States have to respect the "public acts, records, and judicial proceedings of every other state."

It also empowers Congress to admit new states and administer the territories and other federal lands.

Pursuant to the Property Clause of the United States Constitution (Article Four, section 3, clause 2), the Congress has the power to retain, buy, sell, and regulate federal lands, such as by limiting cattle grazing on them.

It also empowers Congress to admit new states and administer the territories and other federal lands.

Organized territories are lands under federal sovereignty (but not part of any state) which were given a measure of self-rule by Congress through an organic act subject to the Congress's plenary powers under the territorial clause of the Constitution's Article Four, section 3.

The Privileges and Immunities Clause requires interstate protection of "privileges and immunities," preventing each state from treating citizens of other states in a discriminatory manner.

The Privileges and Immunities Clause (U.S. Constitution, Article IV, Section 2, Clause 1, also known as the Comity Clause) prevents a state from treating citizens of other states in a discriminatory manner.

The Extradition Clause requires that fugitives from justice be extradited on the demand of executive authority of the state from which they flee.

The Extradition Clause or Interstate Rendition Clause of the United States Constitution is Article IV, Section 2, Clause 2, which provides for the extradition of a criminal back to the state where they allegedly committed a crime.

The Fugitive Slave Clause requires the return of fugitive slaves; this clause has not been repealed, but it was rendered moot by the Thirteenth Amendment, which abolished slavery.

The Fugitive Slave Clause of the United States Constitution, also known as either the Slave Clause or the Fugitives From Labor Clause, is Article IV, Section 2, Clause 3, which requires a "person held to service or labor" (usually a slave, apprentice, or indentured servant) who flees to another state to be returned to the owner in the state from which that person escaped.

Since the 1987 case of Puerto Rico v. Branstad, federal courts may also use the Extradition Clause to require the extradition of fugitives.

Puerto Rico v. Branstad, 483 U.S. 219 (1987), was a case decided by the Supreme Court of the United States that ruled unanimously that federal courts have the power to enforce extraditions based on the Extradition Clause of Article Four of the United States Constitution.

Article Four of the United States Constitution outlines the relationship between the various states, as well as the relationship between each state and the United States federal government.

Under Article IV of the Constitution, which outlines the relationship between the states, each state is required to give full faith and credit to the acts of each other's legislatures and courts, which is generally held to include the recognition of most contracts and criminal judgments, and before 1865, slavery status.

The Supreme Court has held that the Constitution requires all states to be admitted on an equal footing, though the Admissions Clause does not expressly include this requirement.

The Constitution grants to Congress the power to admit new states in Article IV, Section 3, Clause 1, which states:

In Corfield v. Coryell, 6 F. Cas.

In it, he upheld a New Jersey regulation forbidding non-residents from gathering oysters and clams against a challenge that New Jersey's law violated the Article IV Privileges and Immunities Clause and that the New Jersey law regulated interstate commerce in violation of the Commerce Clause.

As free states sought to undermine the federal law, the even more severe Fugitive Slave Act of 1850 was enacted.

The earlier Fugitive Slave Act of 1793 was a Federal law which was written with the intent to enforce Article 4, Section 2, Clause 3 of the United States Constitution, which required the return of runaway slaves.

The Fugitive Slave Clause requires the return of fugitive slaves; this clause has not been repealed, but it was rendered moot by the Thirteenth Amendment, which abolished slavery.

The United States Constitution, ratified in 1788, never uses the words "slave" or "slavery", but recognized its existence in the so-called fugitive slave clause (Article IV, Section 2, Clause 3), the three-fifths clause, and the prohibition on prohibiting importation, for 20 years, of "such Persons as any of the States now existing shall think proper to admit" (Article I, Section 9).

In Kentucky v. Dennison (1860), the Supreme Court held that the federal courts may not compel state governors to surrender fugitives through the issue of writs of mandamus.

Article Four, Section Three, Clause Two of the Constitution provides that "The Congress shall have Power to dispose of and make all needful Rules and Regulations respecting the Territory".

A major issue early in the 20th century was whether the whole Constitution applied to the territories called insular areas by Congress.

Article IV, Section 3, Clause 2 of the United States Constitution grants to United States Congress the responsibility of overseeing these territories, of which there are 14, 3 in the Caribbean Sea and 11 in the Pacific Ocean.

These rulings have helped shape public opinion among Puerto Ricans during the ongoing debate over the commonwealth's political status.

But it remains subject to the Territorial Clause of the U.S. Constitution.

A political crisis in 1840s Rhode Island, the Dorr Rebellion, forced the Supreme Court to rule on the meaning of this clause.

In 1841, activists led by Thomas W. Dorr organized an extralegal convention to draft a state constitution, arguing that the charter government violated the Guarantee Clause in Article Four, Section Four of the United States Constitution.

In Luther v. Borden, the Court held that the determination of whether a state government is a legitimate republican form as guaranteed by the Constitution is a political question to be resolved by the Congress.

Luther v. Borden, 48 U.S. (7 How.) 1 (1849), was a case in which the Supreme Court of the United States established the political question doctrine in controversies arising under the Guarantee Clause of Article Four of the United States Constitution (Art.

A political crisis in 1840s Rhode Island, the Dorr Rebellion, forced the Supreme Court to rule on the meaning of this clause.

Some argued that an electorate made up of only 40% of the state's white men, and based on a colonial charter signed by the British monarch, was un-republican and violated the United States Constitution's Guarantee Clause, Art. IV: Sec. 4 ("The United States shall guarantee to every State in this Union a Republican Form of Government [...]").

In another case, Kleppe v. New Mexico, the Court ruled that the federal Wild Horse and Burro Act was a constitutional exercise of congressional power under the Property Clause – at least insofar as it was applied to a finding of trespass.

The United States District Court for the District of New Mexico held that, under the [[Article Four of the United States Constitution#Clause 2: Federal property and the Territorial Clause|Property Clause of the U.S. Constitution]], Congress could regulate "wild" animals only to protect public land from damage.

In Luther v. Borden, the Court held that the determination of whether a state government is a legitimate republican form as guaranteed by the Constitution is a political question to be resolved by the Congress.

The Guarantee Clause, Article IV, section 4, requires the federal government to "guarantee to every State in this Union a Republican Form of Government".

Article IV, Section 3, Clause 1 of the Constitution grants to Congress the authority to admit new states into the Union.

In another case, Kleppe v. New Mexico, the Court ruled that the federal Wild Horse and Burro Act was a constitutional exercise of congressional power under the Property Clause – at least insofar as it was applied to a finding of trespass.

The panel declared the WFRHBA unconstitutional, stating that its authority was derived from the "territorial clause," Article IV of the United States Constitution, but that animals do not become federal property simply by being on federal land.

However, the Supreme Court, in Texas v. White (1869), held that a state cannot unilaterally do so.

The Guarantee Clause mandates that all U.S. states must be grounded in republican principles such as the consent of the governed.

Due to the 1875 and 1891 court decisions establishing basic definition, in the first version (1892) of the Pledge of Allegiance, which included the word republic, and like Article IV which refers to a Republican form of government, the basic definition of republic is implied and continues to do so in all subsequent versions, including the present edition, by virtue of its consistent inclusion.