Everyone agrees that stealing should be a crime. Theft has been an offense in every society that has recognized property rights. Theft was a crime under the English common law; every state outlaws theft today; and theft of federal property (or property in interstate commerce) is a crime under federal …
Justice is flowing like a river for an Oklahoma mom. A Piedmont police officer was fired for writing an excessively hefty fine for her three-year-old’s “public urination” on the family’s property. Ashley Warden was fined $2,500 earlier this month after three-year-old Dillan pulled down his pants to urinate on his …
Under a recently proposed rule, a clerical error could send someone to prison for five years. In the latest attempt to criminalize seemingly every aspect of our lives, a group of federal bureaucrats in the Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Administration (PHMSA), an agency within the Transportation Department, recently proposed a …
Norman Reimer is executive director of the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers (NACDL). He sat down with us to discuss his organization’s efforts to combat overcriminalization. How did NACDL become involved with overcriminalization? The National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers has always opposed the overly expansive use of criminal …
The United States Constitution is the oldest written constitution still in use. A little more than 225 years ago, there was a meeting of the greatest political minds that had ever been assembled. Each American colony sent its brightest citizens to revise the failing Articles of Confederation. The Framers of …
Apparently, Members of Congress have not been reading our Overcriminalization blogs. How do we know this? Because the International Fisheries Stewardship and Enforcement Act (IFSEA) is the embodiment of much of what our blogs have highlighted is wrong with legislation. The Senate sponsors of IFSEA didn’t have the votes to …
Robert Alt is director of the Rule of Law Programs and senior legal fellow at The Heritage Foundation’s Center for Legal and Judicial Studies. He sat down with us to discuss Heritage’s Overcriminalization project. Q: How long have you been working on the Overcriminalization project? A: Five years. Overcriminalization was …
Should society throw people into jail who admittedly did nothing blameworthy just to set an example for others? That is exactly what the Center for Progressive Reform has suggested doing in a recent report on the Occupational Safety and Health Act. In criminal law, the Supreme Court has embraced what …
