ECM

Certain verbs e.g. want, believe, consider etc. and one complementizer for are able to assign case to the subject of their complement clause. The complementizer for, like the preposition for, has the $\langle$assign-case$\rangle$ feature of its complement set to acc. Since the $\langle$assign-case$\rangle$ feature of the root S_r of the complement tree and the $\langle$case$\rangle$ feature of its NP subject are co-indexed, this leads to the subject being assigned accusative case. ECM verbs have the $\langle$assign-case$\rangle$ feature of their foot S node set to acc. The co-indexation between the $\langle$assign-case$\rangle$ feature of the root S_r and the $\langle$case$\rangle$ feature of the NP subject leads to the subject being assigned accusative case.