Plugging the Gauge Fixing into the Lagrangian

Abstract

A complete analysis of the consequences of introducing a set of holonomic gauge fixing constraints (to fix the dynamics) into a singular Lagrangian is performed. It is shown in general that the dynamical system originated from the reduced Lagrangian erases all the information regarding the first class constraints of the original theory, but retains its second class. It is proved that even though the reduced Lagrangian can be singular, it never possesses any gauge freedom. As an application, the example of $n \cdot A = 0$ gauges in electromagnetism is treated in full detail.