The first ten amendments to the US Constitution, drafted by James Madison, incorporate protections nearly identical to the 1689 English Bill of Rights — arms, no excessive bail, no cruel and unusual punishment, right of petition — but with a radical structural twist: unlike the English document protecting Parliament from the King without limiting the legislature itself, the American version directly limits Congress ("Congress shall make no law...") and becomes supreme constitutional law any citizen can invoke in court to strike down a statute.