"If you were to sit down to read through all of our criminal laws and regulations- or at least flip through them- you would find plenty of surprises, too. You would learn, for example, that it's a federal crime to "injure[]" a government-owned lamp in Washington, D.C., consult with a known pirate, or advertise wine by suggesting its intoxicating qualities. The truth is, we now have so many federal criminal laws covering so many things that one scholar suggests that "there is no one in the United States over the age of 18 who cnanot be indicted for some federal crime." In case you think that's an exaggeration, he adds: "That is not an exaggeration." It's a state of affairs that sometimes makes it hard not to wonder how far we have left to travel to a world described by Lavrentiy Beria, the chief of Joseph Stalin's secret police, who was reputed to have bragged, "Show me the man and I'll show you the crime." Don't think it can happen here? Ask John Yates, who was convicted for an offense he'd probably never heard of, one that few would have imagined would apply to him, and one that robbed him and his family of the life they cherished."
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Academics from the United StatesJustices of the Supreme Court of the United StatesLawyers from the United StatesPeople from DenverGeorgetown Preparatory School alumni
Original Language: English
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p. 22-23
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Neil_Gorsuch
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Neil Gorsuch
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