The Logan Act: Never Used, Often Abused

After disgraced National Security Adviser Michael Flynn pleaded guilty to the FBI and agreed to cooperate with Robert Mueller’s investigation, there’s been much speculation that the special counsel is using the “Logan Act” as leverage in his dealing with potential witnesses.

Let’s hope not. No one has ever been found guilty of violating it since Congress passed the law in 1799. But that fact, which is circulating widely in the media, is a distraction. Far more concerning is another fact about the Logan Act: It has been repeatedly used as a partisan cudgel to harass political opponents for more than two American centuries. If Mueller makes this obscure law the centerpiece of his case against the Trump administration, he runs the risk of inviting accusations, however unfounded, that he, too, is a partisan hack.