Congress

Principles for Electoral Count Act Reform

Bob Bauer, Jack Goldsmith
Monday, April 4, 2022, 10:01 AM

The group agrees that Congress should reform the ECA in time for the 2024 election, and offers both core reform principles and specific proposals for statutory revision in an effort to contribute to a constitutionally sound bipartisan consensus in Congress.

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For the last several months, at the invitation of the leadership of the American Law Institute, a group whose 10 members span a range of legal and political views came together to consider possible Electoral Count Act (ECA) reforms. (We were the group’s co-chairs.) Lawfare readers need no introduction to the ECA. It is widely believed that the 135-year-old statute is poorly conceived, confusingly drafted and ill-suited to address Congress’s role in the resolution of close electoral contests.

Today our group is releasing the unanimous conclusion of its deliberations, which can be found here. The group agrees that Congress should reform the ECA in time for the 2024 election, and offers both core reform principles and specific proposals for statutory revision in an effort to contribute to a constitutionally sound bipartisan consensus in Congress.

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Bob Bauer

Bob Bauer

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Bob Bauer served as White House Counsel to President Obama. In 2013, the President named Bob to be Co-Chair of the Presidential Commission on Election Administration, and in 2021, President Biden named him Co-Chair of the Presidential Commission on the Supreme Court of the United States. He is a Professor of Practice and Distinguished Scholar in Residence at New York University School of Law and teaches and writes about presidential power, political reform, and legal ethics.
Jack Goldsmith

Jack Goldsmith

@jacklgoldsmith
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Jack Goldsmith is the Learned Hand Professor at Harvard Law School, co-founder of Lawfare, and a Non-Resident Senior Fellow at the American Enterprise Institute. Before coming to Harvard, Professor Goldsmith served as Assistant Attorney General, Office of Legal Counsel from 2003-2004, and Special Counsel to the Department of Defense from 2002-2003.

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