{"id":22178,"date":"2026-07-30T17:06:26","date_gmt":"2026-07-30T12:06:26","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/?p=22178"},"modified":"2026-07-30T17:06:26","modified_gmt":"2026-07-30T12:06:26","slug":"pleading-the-fifth-invokes-a-constitutional-amendment-that-has-a-long-history-in-us-society","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/?p=22178","title":{"rendered":"&#8216;Pleading the Fifth&#8217; invokes a constitutional amendment that has a long history in US society"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><script>\r\n  atOptions = {\r\n    'key' : '644b717812d811d6a1c1fc5b6ccd6fa6',\r\n    'format' : 'iframe',\r\n    'height' : 90,\r\n    'width' : 728,\r\n    'params' : {}\r\n  };\r\n<\/script>\r\n<script src=\"https:\/\/www.highperformanceformat.com\/644b717812d811d6a1c1fc5b6ccd6fa6\/invoke.js\"><\/script>\r\n<br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div data-testid=\"prism-article-body\">\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao MvWXB TjIXL aGjvy ebVHC \"><span class=\"oyrPY qlwaB AGxeB  \">NEW YORK &#8212; <\/span>It was important enough to the framers of the U.S. Constitution to be included in the first 10 amendments known as the Bill of Rights \u2014 that no person \u201cshall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">As part of the Fifth Amendment, the right against self-incrimination is well known to the general public thanks to years of legal and police procedural shows on television as well as instances of <a class=\"zZygg UbGlr iFzkS qdXbA WCDhQ DbOXS tqUtK GpWVU iJYzE \" data-testid=\"prism-linkbase\" href=\"https:\/\/apnews.com\/article\/fauci-covid19-pandemic-senate-rand-paul-a774a79e46824ebec9e8e270b9cb9825\">high-profile use in real life<\/a>. The amendment also includes a right to due process and protects against being prosecuted twice for the same offense. <\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">It has seeped into the culture, too. \u201cPleading the Fifth\u201d has become an idiom in the United States, used jokingly in casual conversation as a way to get out of answering a possibly uncomfortable question.<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">The general principle is not a uniquely American one. Its roots include English common law dating back to the 17th century. <\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">At the time the Constitution was being written, it was enshrined along with other amendments to put limits on the newly created federal government. The Fifth Amendment and a handful of others were focused on criminal justice issues, with other amendments including things like the right to a lawyer and a speedy jury trial, and a prohibition of cruel and unusual punishment.<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">One of the core tenets of the U.S. criminal justice system is that people are innocent until proven guilty, and that it&#8217;s up to the prosecuting power to prove guilt. Without a right to avoid self-incrimination, people could be put in the position of having to prove their own innocence rather than being shown as guilty.<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">Over the course of U.S. history, the Fifth Amendment has expanded beyond federal criminal cases to the state court level, and to civil cases as well. There&#8217;s a difference, though.<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">In criminal cases, if someone on trial invokes the amendment and refuses to testify, the jurors must be told that they can&#8217;t assume that silence equals guilt. In civil cases, drawing a negative inference from a refusal to testify can be allowed.<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">Of course, even in criminal cases, if jurors are told it doesn&#8217;t mean a defendant is guilty, they could still believe that not testifying correlates to having done what they are accused of. Witnesses can also plead the Fifth, but they can answer other questions \u2014 as opposed to defendants, for whom it&#8217;s all or nothing in regards to testifying.<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">The Fifth Amendment&#8217;s use has also shown up in hearings before Congress, when those who have been subpoenaed to testify under oath reference it out of concerns that something they say could then be used in some kind of criminal proceeding.<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">In a hearing before a Republican-led Senate committee about how he handled the COVID-19 pandemic, <a class=\"zZygg UbGlr iFzkS qdXbA WCDhQ DbOXS tqUtK GpWVU iJYzE \" data-testid=\"prism-linkbase\" href=\"https:\/\/apnews.com\/hub\/anthony-fauci\">Dr. Anthony Fauci<\/a> turned to the Fifth in declining to answer questions. It drew scorn from Republicans, while Democrats supported him.<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC TjIXL aGjvy \">In 2022, when he was out of the White House after his first term as president, <a class=\"zZygg UbGlr iFzkS qdXbA WCDhQ DbOXS tqUtK GpWVU iJYzE \" data-testid=\"prism-linkbase\" href=\"https:\/\/apnews.com\/article\/donald-trump-ny-investigation-testimony-a4e6264d44b194d24dfb916ffc7f51ca\">Donald Trump<\/a> used the Fifth repeatedly in a deposition for a civil case against the Trump Organization in New York.<\/p>\n<p class=\"EkqkG IGXmU nlgHS yuUao lqtkC eTIW sUzSN \">In the 1950s, when Sen. Joe McCarthy held anticommunist hearings, some witnesses used the amendment when being questioned. Even though they had the right, McCarthy condemned them for it, and they faced consequences that included public censure and blacklisting.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<script async=\"async\" data-cfasync=\"false\" src=\"https:\/\/pl30214220.effectivecpmnetwork.com\/9ab3d4df8a7e1a6171e16ddbf732cc19\/invoke.js\"><\/script>\r\n<div id=\"container-9ab3d4df8a7e1a6171e16ddbf732cc19\"><\/div>\r\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>NEW YORK &#8212; It was important enough to the framers of the U.S. Constitution to be included in the first 10 amendments known as the Bill of Rights \u2014 that no person \u201cshall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself.\u201d As part of the Fifth Amendment, the right against self-incrimination&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":22179,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/i.abcnewsfe.com\/a\/4c6791c4-5d66-44c3-8222-44d4863c87e3\/wirestory_58b3dac34022c5adab907e3c33349d46_16x9.jpg?w=1600","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-22178","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-pics-news"],"brizy_media":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22178","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=22178"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22178\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/22179"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=22178"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=22178"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=22178"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}