[M]any criminal laws that Congress enacts “fail to protect the innocent with adequate ‘mens rea’ requirements,” and “many of them are so vague, far-reaching, and imprecise that few lawyers, much less non-lawyers, could determine what specific conduct they prohibit and punish.” [More]Funny though, how clear intent is ignored for some.
[Via Mack H]
1 comment:
I've had a magistrate throw up the "ignorance of the law is no excuse" argument before. What I later learned is that is an ancient maxim that applied ONLY to the common law, not statutory or any other kind of man-made BS. The common law is, literally, the law that is common to ALL men (and women) and was expected to be known by any man - at least in the Western (read: Christian) cultures. A common law researcher/lecturer pointed out to me that nobody could reasonably be expected to "know" all of the tens of thousands of federal statutes, much less the state statutes, county and local municipal ordinances, policies and procedures. Men are not "persons" mentioned in those statutes to begin with, so none of those statutory "laws" apply to them as it is. But try convincing a magistrate of that, as he's about to impose a $300 fine on you for painting "your" house a color that's not on their approved list, or allowing "weeds" to be over 3" high on what is (supposedly) "your" land. Hint: it's NOT "your" land if you are paying the extortion of property tax on it. The county holds the title on it, not you, and you're listed as the "tenant" on the deed. But that's because you're ignorant of land law and what the definition of "allodial" is and how it applies to the phrases on the original land patent title.
But no more ignorant, it seems, than the congressional staffers are of the meanings of legal words they use when drafting those statutes the congressmen/women pass every day (without reading them first, in most cases).
-MM
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