2025 civics test · Question 5 · Principles of American Government
How are changes made to the U.S. Constitution?
Any one of these answers is accepted
- Amendments
- The amendment process
What this means
Changes to the Constitution are made through amendments. The accepted answers are “amendments” or “the amendment process.”
Amending the Constitution is meant to be hard, so it does not change easily. The usual path has two steps:
- Proposed by a two-thirds vote of both houses of Congress.
- Ratified (approved) by three-fourths of the states, which today means 38 of the 50 states.
Because the bar is so high, the Constitution has only been amended 27 times since 1789. The first ten of those amendments are the Bill of Rights.
For the test, you do not need the full process. The one-word answer “amendments” is enough.
Why this is on the test
Knowing that the Constitution can be changed, and how, sets up several other test questions about specific amendments like the 10th and the 22nd.
How this question is asked
On the 2025 civics test, the officer asks up to 20 of the 128 questions out loud and you pass by answering 12 correctly. You answer in your own words. There is no multiple choice and nothing to write down for the civics portion.
Related questions
More from Principles of American Government.
- 1 What is the form of government of the United States?
- 2 What is the supreme law of the land?
- 3 Name one thing the U.S. Constitution does.
- 4 The U.S. Constitution starts with the words "We the People." What does "We the People" mean?
- 6 What does the Bill of Rights protect?
- 7 How many amendments does the U.S. Constitution have?