Powell v Alabama established that federal amendments started applying to states.

• A. It required that states adopt all federal amendments without modification
• B. Federal Amendments started applying to states
• C. It involved the right to a public defender in all cases
• D. It limited federal protections to federal actors only

Answer: (B)

Incorporation is the idea that federal constitutional protections can bind state governments through the Fourteenth Amendment’s due process clause. Powell v. Alabama illustrates this by holding that in capital cases, the defendant must have effective legal counsel provided by the state if they cannot afford it. That decision extends a federal right—previously guaranteed in the Sixth Amendment—to the states, showing how federal protections begin to apply to state criminal proceedings.

This is why the statement that federal amendments started applying to states best fits. It captures the move from federal rights operating only against federal actors to those rights also constraining state action through due process.

The other options don’t fit as well. It wasn’t about states adopting all federal amendments without modification, nor about a universal right to a public defender in every case, and it doesn’t say federal protections are limited to federal actors; in fact, it shows the opposite by applying a federal right to state action.