Civil Rights Act of 1871 Law and Legal Definition
The Civil Rights Act of 1871 is a United States federal law that prohibits ethnic violence against blacks. The Act was passed to protect southern blacks from the Ku Klux Klan by providing a civil remedy for abuses then being committed in the South.
Pursuant to 42 USCS § 1983 “Every person who, under color of any statute, ordinance, regulation, custom, or usage, of any State or Territory or the District of Columbia, subjects, or causes to be subjected, any citizen of the United States or other person within the jurisdiction thereof to the deprivation of any rights, privileges, or immunities secured by the Constitution and laws, shall be liable to the party injured in an action at law, suit in equity, or other proper proceeding for redress, except that in any action brought against a judicial officer for an act or omission taken in such officer's judicial capacity, injunctive relief shall not be granted unless a declaratory decree was violated or declaratory relief was unavailable.”
