No, they didn't. This is just the kneejerk panic reaction to not understanding the law, or the opinion. You just want to be mad, and this is rage bait. Allow me to actually tell you what happened, because I did read the opinion.
What it said was the law, as-written, does not apply to state and local officials. It still applies to federal ones. And any state and local laws applying a similar law to state and local officials still stands. Congress can also still change the law to apply to state and local, but that would trigger a 10A challenge.
It applied the "Rule of Leniency" which is a very good thing. Also that rule is Gorsuch's baby, he applies it in pretty much every case he can, and I haven't found one where he did not. The rule of leniency says, basically:
Whenever a criminal law is ambiguous, it must be interpreted in a manner most favorable to the defendant.
And that is what you want. Trust me, that is absolutely what you want. It's a natural outgrowth of the presumption of innocence. You must be proven guilty beyond reasonable doubt, so if there is doubt as to how the law should be applied, then that doubt favors the defendant.
This case was similar to the bumpstcok case, and in both cases SCOTUS essentially said:
The law says Y, not X. Maybe congress meant for it to say X, but that is not what it says. If congress wants it to say X, they can change it to say X. But currently, it says Y.
And that is how the law should be. Law works as-written, especially criminal law. This is what you want, because let me give you a very possible example of it worked "as interpreted" instead:
Well, I interpret that life starts at conception, so abortion is murder, guilty.
See how quickly that can go very wrong? Criminal law works as-written, and this was the correct decision. It may not be the moral decision, or the desired decision, but that is for CONGRESS to act on. Congress and only Congress can make laws.
This was an extremely narrow ruling, it did not say "Bribery is legal" it said "The law, as currently written, does not apply to State and Local officials."
You want to be mad at someone, be mad at congress for writing shitty laws. Only Congress has the power to make laws. The Executive branch must enforce them as written, and the judiciary must apply them as written.
Not quite. The law still applies to state officials, the law just doesn't cover gratuities, only bribes. There is a federal law against bribery that covers bribes and gratuities. They made a law against those receiving federal money (which generally is state officials) receiving bribes but it only had wording that matched the portion of the federal law which covers bribes and did not have language similar to the portion of the law covering gratuities.
This isn't even a case of congress writing shitty laws. They wrote the law originally to have wording similar to the gratuities provision. They went back and changes it two years later to have the higher standard of the bribes provision of the law. This was likely the intent of congress to only regulate bribery at the federal level. Gratuities can be, and are regulated at the state level for state officials.
Not quite. The specific section challenged does apply to state and local officials. The specific section challenged just doesn't cover gratuities. 201 which covers federal officials however is unchanged and covers both bribes and gratuities using two provisions. 666 which covers state and local officials receiving federal money only has one provision, and it only covers bribery.
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u/AlphaTangoFoxtrt 5d ago edited 5d ago
No, they didn't. This is just the kneejerk panic reaction to not understanding the law, or the opinion. You just want to be mad, and this is rage bait. Allow me to actually tell you what happened, because I did read the opinion.
What it said was the law, as-written, does not apply to state and local officials. It still applies to federal ones. And any state and local laws applying a similar law to state and local officials still stands. Congress can also still change the law to apply to state and local, but that would trigger a 10A challenge.
It applied the "Rule of Leniency" which is a very good thing. Also that rule is Gorsuch's baby, he applies it in pretty much every case he can, and I haven't found one where he did not. The rule of leniency says, basically:
And that is what you want. Trust me, that is absolutely what you want. It's a natural outgrowth of the presumption of innocence. You must be proven guilty beyond reasonable doubt, so if there is doubt as to how the law should be applied, then that doubt favors the defendant.
This case was similar to the bumpstcok case, and in both cases SCOTUS essentially said:
And that is how the law should be. Law works as-written, especially criminal law. This is what you want, because let me give you a very possible example of it worked "as interpreted" instead:
See how quickly that can go very wrong? Criminal law works as-written, and this was the correct decision. It may not be the moral decision, or the desired decision, but that is for CONGRESS to act on. Congress and only Congress can make laws.
Here is the opinion, in pdf form
This was an extremely narrow ruling, it did not say "Bribery is legal" it said "The law, as currently written, does not apply to State and Local officials."
You want to be mad at someone, be mad at congress for writing shitty laws. Only Congress has the power to make laws. The Executive branch must enforce them as written, and the judiciary must apply them as written.