*If said layperson swore like nobody’s business, had a mild but pervasive distate for almost every sitting member of the US government, awkward pride in American historical documents, and an unnecessary knowledge of Supreme Court cases.

First Amendment: Say what you want, pray what you want, print what you want*. Assemble where you want with whom you want to petition the government because you believe in your heart of hearts that they’ve done something kind of shitty**.
Second Amendment: Right to bear arms.  Some people erect legal and moral altars to this Amendment while others wish to cut it out of the original document with an X-acto knife.  It is what it is.  In fact, the right to bear arms is included conditionally, because of the right to maintain a militia.  So it’s not just any arms.  But what do I know, I’m just getting a degree in this sort of thing.

Third Amendment: No quartering of soldiers during peacetime, wartime, or any other goddamn time.

Fourth Amendment: No unreasonable searches and seizures—reasonableness may be determined by presence of warrant, based on probable cause.  Not “I hear you had something to do with this bomb, but I just gotta check real quick.  Oh man, no bombs, but we found you’re porn, so you’re pretty much guilty.***”  Probable cause.  Probable.

Fifth Amendment: No one may set a verbal trap for you to fall into whilst in court so that you end up incriminating yourself.  You can’t be charged for the same crime twice.  Other various riles of indictment by jury and eminent domain.  Right to due process.

Sixth Amendment: Right to a fair and speedy trial, right of “Say that to my face, motherfucker”, to confront said motherfucker, to grab a witness, and to see a skeeve master lawyer.

Seventh Amendment: Right to trial by jury of peers.

Eighth Amendment: No excessive fines or excessive bail, no cruel and unusual punishment.  The electric chair is nary a tickle, and therefore does not count.

Ninth Amendment: Just because the Constitution doesn’t explicitly list a right doesn’t mean you don’t have that right.  The Constitution is not comprehensive, it is just a helpful reminder that we have goddamn rights in this country, and they’re pretty fucking great, and we have to be aware of them and have them protected, because folks will try to take them.  They have before, and they will again, mark my words.

Tenth Amendment: The federal government only has the rights explicitly given them; all else to states; all else to folks.

Eleventh Amendment: Sovereign immunity—states cannot commit a crime, and therefore cannot be prosecuted or sued.  This is meant to pat states on the head and ensure that their sovereignties are not threatened by the federal government.  Also, foreigners and out-of-state-ers cannot sue a state.

Twelfth Amendment: Procedure for electing President and Vice President (and the minutiae of these procedures is largely left up to states).

Thirteenth Amendment: No slavery, no involuntary servitude (except as punishment for crime).  That shit’s fucked up, and we do not condone it****.

Fourteenth Amendment: Everyone’s favorite.  Used to apply to Bill of Rights directly to the states, usually in the name of upholding civil liberties*^.  Defines citizenship and holds that no one may be deprived of life, liberty, or property without due process of law.  This is my favorite amendment as well.

Fifteenth Amendment: No one may be turned away from the voting booth based on race, color, or identity as former slave.  Hell to the yeah.

Sixteenth Amendment: Federal government may collect income tax.  For uses both legitimate and nefarious.  What are you going to do?*^*

Seventeenth Amendment: Direct election of Senators by popular vote.  None of that House of Lords fuckery.  What do you think this is, England?

Eighteenth Amendment: No alcohol for anyone ever.  I see what you’re doing in that bathtub, bitch.  Not gonna fly.

Nineteenth Amendment: Women can vote.  That’s right you sons of bitches and bitches alike—women have to power to cast a motherfucking ballot with the rest of you miserable, ill-informed louses.  You know why?  I’ll tell you why.  Because a woman is a fucking person.  As much of a fucking person as you.  And if you ever tried to deny a woman the right to vote, or somehow slighted a woman based on the simple fact that she was a woman, and not some underlying problem like she was a real spoon-bender, then she is more of a person than you, sir.  So stick that in your affected pipe and smoke yourself to lung cancer on it.

Twentieth Amendment: Fixes dates for commencement of Congress and Presidential term.

Twenty-First Amendment: JK about that no alcohol thing.

Twenty-Second Amendment: The president may serve no more than two terms, or a maximum of ten years.**^*

Twenty-Third Amendment: I guess DC can have some Electors?

Twenty-Fourth Amendment: You will not be turned away at the voting booth just because you didn’t pay poll taxes.

Twenty-Fifth Amendment: Defines process of presidential succession, allowing Geena Davis to succeed old what’s-his-name when he died, to the unending distress and despair of Donald Sutherland—wait, what?  That was just an utterly stellar bomb TV show?  You mean we didn’t solve the North Korea nuclear crisis that easily?

Nooooooooooooooooooo

Twenty-Sixth Amendment: At the time of this writing, I can vote.

Twenty-Seventh Amendment:  No pay changes pertaining to Congressional members may take effect until after the next Congressional election.  You know, these jerks weren’t supposed to be paid in the first place.  I’m just saying.**^**

*Except when you infringe upon the rights of others by doing so, but that’s another legal precedent for another day! 

**You’re probably right.

***Mapp v. Ohio (1961).  Also Katz v. United States, which set the precedent that made phone-tapping without a warrant illegal

****Anymore

*^See: Every Warren Court decision ever.  You guys, Warren was my favorite CJ.  You know he was appointed because Eisenhower thought the dude would be a safe choice and wouldn’t rock any boats during his tenure.  Warren had had a conservative record in California up until that point, so you can’t blame him, I suppose.  But man, Warran redefined “legislating from the bench”, had the phrase cut out of gold, and practically adhered it to the front door of the Supreme Court.

*^*See: the First Amendment

**^*Looking at you, FDR

**^**Fun fact: this amendment was ratified 203 years after it had been submitted.  (Maryland started it.)