[1][2] The Enforcement Act of 1870 prohibits discrimination by state officials in voter registration on the basis of race, color, or previous condition of servitude.

It establishes penalties for interfering with a person's right to vote and gave federal courts the power to enforce the act.

Sections 2, 3, 4, and 5 provide civil remedies for people who are disenfranchised in several different ways, and additionally makes such acts a misdemeanor: In each of the above cases, the person responsible must pay $500 compensation to the victim, and on conviction be fined at least $500, and at the discretion of the court, imprisoned for a period between one month and one year.

[5][page needed] Section 6 makes it a felony for two or more persons to "band or conspire together, or go in disguise upon the public highway, or upon the premises of another", in order to violate any provision of the Act or intimidate anyone in regard to their constitutional or federal legal rights.

Section 10 gives marshals and their deputies the duty to execute warrants under this act, on pain of a $1000 penalty payable to the victim of disenfranchisement.

It also gives them the power of posse comitatus, including the use of US armed forces and militia, for the purpose of enforcing such warrants.

Section 11 prohibits interfering with process under this act, including obstruction, harbouring fugitives, and rescue of detainees.

Section 12 authorizes fees for commissioners, district attorneys, marshals, their deputies, and clerks, in relation to process under this act, including costs of imprisonment, to be paid out of the US Treasury and recoverable from the offender on conviction.

Section 13 empowers the President to authorize use of militias and the armed forces to enforce process under this act.

(Such use was subsequently made generally illegal under the Posse Comitatus Act of 1878, unless authorized by Congress, such as in this section.)