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Guarantee Clause
The Guarantee Clause, also known as the Republican Form of Government Clause, is in Article IV, Section 4 of the United States Constitution. It requires the United States to guarantee every state a republican form of government and provide protection from invasion and domestic violence.
Article IV, Section 4:
The United States shall guarantee to every State in this Union a Republican Form of Government, and shall protect each of them against Invasion; and on Application of the Legislature, or of the Executive (when the Legislature cannot be convened) against domestic Violence.
The original substance of the clause was first proposed at the Constitutional Convention as part of the Virginia Plan, presented by Edmund Randolph.
The Guarantee Clause reflects a founding understanding of republicanism, which entails governing through electoral processes. As written in the Federalist No. 57: "The elective mode of obtaining rulers is the characteristic policy of republican government." Quoting Montesquieu, James Madison wrote in Federalist No. 43 that "should a popular insurrection happen in one of the States, the others are able to quell it. Should abuses creep into one part, they are reformed by those that remain sound."
At the time of the founding, however, states restricted the right to vote based on race, sex, and property ownership. Madison suggested that these existing practices in the states, which he called "existing republican forms", may be continued. Article I, Section 2 of the Constitution explicitly gave the states power to decide voting qualifications, although Article I, Section 4 gives Congress authority to regulate the time, place, and manner of federal elections.
Beginning in the aftermath of the Civil War, subsequent amendments broadened the right to vote and restricted discriminatory state laws. These include the Fifteenth (no denial of right to vote based on race), Nineteenth (no denial of right to vote based on sex), Twenty-Fourth (no poll tax), and the Twenty-Sixth Amendment (reducing the voting age to eighteen).
It is understood that the Guarantee Clause requires states to produce governments by electoral processes, as opposed to inherited monarchies, dictatorships, or military rule.
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Guarantee Clause
The Guarantee Clause, also known as the Republican Form of Government Clause, is in Article IV, Section 4 of the United States Constitution. It requires the United States to guarantee every state a republican form of government and provide protection from invasion and domestic violence.
Article IV, Section 4:
The United States shall guarantee to every State in this Union a Republican Form of Government, and shall protect each of them against Invasion; and on Application of the Legislature, or of the Executive (when the Legislature cannot be convened) against domestic Violence.
The original substance of the clause was first proposed at the Constitutional Convention as part of the Virginia Plan, presented by Edmund Randolph.
The Guarantee Clause reflects a founding understanding of republicanism, which entails governing through electoral processes. As written in the Federalist No. 57: "The elective mode of obtaining rulers is the characteristic policy of republican government." Quoting Montesquieu, James Madison wrote in Federalist No. 43 that "should a popular insurrection happen in one of the States, the others are able to quell it. Should abuses creep into one part, they are reformed by those that remain sound."
At the time of the founding, however, states restricted the right to vote based on race, sex, and property ownership. Madison suggested that these existing practices in the states, which he called "existing republican forms", may be continued. Article I, Section 2 of the Constitution explicitly gave the states power to decide voting qualifications, although Article I, Section 4 gives Congress authority to regulate the time, place, and manner of federal elections.
Beginning in the aftermath of the Civil War, subsequent amendments broadened the right to vote and restricted discriminatory state laws. These include the Fifteenth (no denial of right to vote based on race), Nineteenth (no denial of right to vote based on sex), Twenty-Fourth (no poll tax), and the Twenty-Sixth Amendment (reducing the voting age to eighteen).
It is understood that the Guarantee Clause requires states to produce governments by electoral processes, as opposed to inherited monarchies, dictatorships, or military rule.