The Ku Klux Klan Act and the Civil Rights Revolution: How Civil Rights Litigation Came to Regulate Police and Correctional Officer Misconduct

Section 1983 of Title 42 of the United States Code (originally, and more colorfully, known as Section One of the Ku Klux Klan Act, and also known as the Civil Rights Act of 1871) is the workhorse of modem civil rights litigation. Section 1983 provides a remedy to any person whose federally protected rights have been abridged by any other person acting under the color of state law or custom. Thus, the rights protected by this Act change with changing notions of what constitutes a constitutional or federally protected right as well as changing notions of what the appropriate remedy might be. Therefore, the history of this act follows two strains. First, there is the problem of figuring out just what the legislators in 1871 meant to do when they passed Section One of the Ku Klux Klan Act. Second, the rapid expansion of constitutionally protected rights as applied to the states in the twentieth century radically changed section 1983's scope of action. Both strands must be understood to gain an appreciation for how this act works in modem America