5 U.S.C. § 7325
Section 7325 · Political activity permitted; employees residing in certain municipalities
Amended 3 times on record
Applied in 7 court decisions — leading case Joseph v. United States Civil Service Commission (1977)
Most recently applied in Marcellus v. Virginia State Board of Elections (February 2017)
How often courts cite this section
Court decisions citing this, by year.Markers show enactment, consequential amendments, and circuit splits over this section — watch for a citation surge after a change or a disagreement. The dip in the last several years is a data-coverage gap, not a real trend — our corpus holds fewer opinions from the most recent years, so recent citations are undercounted.
The Office of Personnel Management may prescribe regulations permitting employees, without regard to the prohibitions in paragraphs (2) and (3) of section 7323(a) and paragraph (2) of section 7323(b) of this title, to take an active part in political management and political campaigns involving the municipality or other political subdivision in which they reside, to the extent the Office considers it to be in their domestic interest, when—
(1) the municipality or political subdivision is—
(A) the District of Columbia;
(B) in Maryland or Virginia and in the immediate vicinity of the District of Columbia; or
(C) a municipality in which the majority of voters are employed by the Government of the United States; and
(2) the Office determines that because of special or unusual circumstances which exist in the municipality or political subdivision it is in the domestic interest of the employees and individuals to permit that political participation.
Editorial notes U.S. Code · Office of the Law Revision Counsel
Prior Provisions
A prior section 7325, Pub. L. 89–554, Sept. 6, 1966, 80 Stat. 526; Pub. L. 96–54, §2(a)(44), Aug. 14, 1979, 93 Stat. 384, related to penalties, prior to the general revision of this subchapter by Pub. L. 103–94.
Amendments
2012—Par. (1). Pub. L. 112–230 amended par. (1) generally. Prior to amendment, par. (1) read as follows: “the municipality or political subdivision is in Maryland or Virginia and in the immediate vicinity of the District of Columbia, or is a municipality in which the majority of voters are employed by the Government of the United States; and”.
1996—Pub. L. 104–93 inserted “and paragraph (2) of section 7323(b)” after “section 7323(a)”.
Effective Date of 2012 Amendment
Amendment by Pub. L. 112–230 effective 30 days after Dec. 28, 2012, see section 5(a) of Pub. L. 112–230, set out as a note under section 1501 of this title.