When was the last time you thought about the Third Amendment? It states: “No Soldier shall, in time of peace be quartered in any house, without the consent of the Owner, nor in time of war, but in a manner to be prescribed by law.” It’s simple, straightforward, and yet, it’s the least litigated amendment in the Bill of Rights. It seems like a relic of history that isn’t especially relevant today. So… Why did the Founders include it? When the Constitution was drafted, quartering troops in private homes was a hot-button issue. After the French and Indian War, the British Parliament passed a 1765 Quartering Act that required American colonists to provide barracks for soldiers. If barracks were unavailable, the troops had to be housed on private property like inns, stables, or barns. And the colonists were also required to provide firewood, bedding, and beer for the troops. The colonists were already concerned about the presence of professional soldiers. Naturally, they objected to these quartering requirements, and tensions between troops and civilians in Boston eventually resulted in the Boston Massacre of 1770 which in turn ignited the Revolutionary War. So, this tyrannical behavior was explicitly forbidden in the amendments for the new Constitution, although quartering troops in private homes has not actually been an issue since then. That’s left some people questioning the 3rd Amendment’s purpose. Although the Supreme Court has never decided a case on the basis of the Third Amendment, it has made reference to it in a couple of important opinions. Controversially, the Court cited the Third Amendment, along with other amendments, as establishing a right to privacy. In Griswold v. Connecticut, the Court ruled that this implied right to privacy entitled married couples to use contraception without fear of state interference. Quote, “The Third Amendment in its prohibition against the quartering of soldiers ‘in any house’ in time of peace without the consent of the owner is another facet of that privacy,” wrote Justice William O. Douglas in the majority opinion. A couple of lower court cases have more explicitly addressed the Third Amendment itself. In 1982, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit decided Engblom v. Carey. The governor of New York had evicted striking correctional officers from their state-provided housing and quartered National Guard troops there instead. The court ruled in favor of the governor but did note that the National Guard were “soldiers” for the purposes of the Third Amendment. In 2015, the U.S. District Court of Nevada decided Mitchell v. City of Henderson, Nevada. The plaintiff in that case claimed that police officers violated his Third Amendment rights when they temporarily occupied his house to address a problem next door. The court ruled that police aren’t “soldiers” under the Third Amendment and they didn’t occupy the house long enough to be “quartered” there. Some scholars argue that the Third Amendment does offer insight into the relationship between citizens and the military. It could potentially apply to a government response in the event of a terrorist attack or natural disaster, if armed forces needed to shelter on private property. For now, the Third Amendment may not be needed. But it’s still an important reminder of the rights that we possess against tyrannical governments; rights that the Founding generation could not take for granted.