THE SUPPORT-OR-ADVOCACY CLAUSES

Authors

Richard Primus, Theodore J. St. Antoine Collegiate Professor, The University of Michigan Law SchoolFollow
Cameron O. Kistler, Counsel, Protect Democracy

Keywords

Reconstruction, civil rights

Abstract

Two little known clauses of a Reconstruction-era civil rights statute are potentially powerful weapons for litigators seeking to protect the integrity of federal elections. For the clauses to achieve their potential, however, the courts will need to settle correctly a contested question of statutory interpretation: do the clauses create substantive rights, or do they merely create remedies for substantive rights specified elsewhere? The correct answer is that the clauses create substantive rights.

Recommended Citation

Richard Primus and Cameron O. Kistler, THE SUPPORT-OR-ADVOCACY CLAUSES, 89 Fordham L. Rev. 145 (2020).
Available at: https://ir.lawnet.fordham.edu/flr/vol89/iss1/15