{"id":17932,"date":"2012-07-31T13:05:08","date_gmt":"2012-07-31T18:05:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/?p=17932"},"modified":"2012-07-31T13:05:08","modified_gmt":"2012-07-31T18:05:08","slug":"dorsey-v-united-states-so-long-saving-statute","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/2012\/07\/dorsey-v-united-states-so-long-saving-statute\/","title":{"rendered":"Dorsey v. United States: So Long, Saving Statute?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Last month, in\u00a0Dorsey v. United States<\/em><\/a>\u00a0(No. 11-5683), the Supreme Court resolved an important circuit split on the interpretation of the Fair Sentencing Act of 2010. \u00a0The FSA softened the controversial mandatory minimum sentences for crack cocaine offenses that have been in place since 1986. \u00a0There\u2019s no question that crack offenders who committed their crimes after the statute\u2019s effective date, August 3, 2010, benefit from the new regime. \u00a0However, the lower courts have divided over the handling of crimes committed before the effective date, but sentenced after it. \u00a0Although this may sound like a minor dispute, given the volume of crack offenses prosecuted in federal court and the eleven-month median time between indictment and sentencing in these cases, there may be hundreds or thousands of defendants who are affected by its resolution.<\/p>\n

Such timing questions are often resolved by reference to the federal \u201csaving statute\u201d of 1871 (1 U.S.C. \u00a7109), which indicates that the law in place at the time of an offense should normally govern the penalty. \u00a0However, this is only a default principle; earlier Supreme Court decisions indicate that Congress can make reduced penalties applicable to all defendants if Congress demonstrates such an intent either expressly or by necessary implication. \u00a0Since the FSA did not expressly address the question one way or another,\u00a0Dorsey\u00a0<\/em>turned on the finding of implied congressional intent. \u00a0By a narrow 5-4 margin, the Court decided that Congress had indeed intended to make the FSA applicable to all defendants sentenced after the statute took effect.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

As indicated by the circuit split and the Court\u2019s own 5-4 decision (and also, for that matter, by the\u00a0unusual 5-5 split of the en banc Seventh Circuit on this question<\/a>), the record of congressional intent was equivocal, and reasonable minds might differ on its interpretation.<\/p>\n

The Court\u2019s majority cited an array of considerations specific to the FSA in support of its holding, suggesting that the case may have no broader significance beyond its (important) consequences for a (sizable) group of crack defendants who have been sentenced in the past two years.<\/p>\n

But there is one uncertain strand of the Court\u2019s reasoning that may point to a more fundamental change in the retroactivity analysis for sentencing statutes. \u00a0In essence, the Court suggested that the saving statute\u2019s default principle may be trumped \u00a0by the default principle of the later Sentencing Reform Act:<\/p>\n

[T]he Sentencing Reform Act sets forth a special and different background principle.<\/em>\u00a0That statute says that when \u201cdetermining the particular sentence to be imposed\u201d in an initial sentencing, the sentencing court \u201cshall consider,\u201d among other things, the \u201csentencing range\u201d established by the Guidelines that are \u201cin effect on the date the defendant is sentenced<\/em>.\u201d 18 U. S. C. \u00a73553(a)(4)(A)(ii) (emphasis added). Although the Constitution\u2019s\u00a0Ex Post Facto<\/em>\u00a0Clause, Art. I, \u00a79, cl. 3, prohibits applying a new Act\u2019s higher penalties to pre-Act conduct, it does not prohibit applying lower penalties. . . . The Sentencing Commission has consequently instructed sentencing judges to \u201cuse the Guidelines Manual in effect on the date that the defendant is sentenced,\u201d regardless of when the defendant committed the offense, unless doing so \u201cwould violate the\u00a0ex post facto\u00a0<\/em>clause.\u201d USSG \u00a71B1.11. And therefore when the Commission adopts new, lower Guidelines amendments, those amendments become effective to offenders who committed an offense prior to the adoption of the new amendments but are sentenced thereafter. Just as we assume Congress was aware of the 1871 Act\u2019s background norm, so we assume that Congress was aware of this different background sentencing principle. \u00a0(13)<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Read for all it\u2019s worth, this language may suggest that the 1871 saving statute no longer provides the default principle when Congress lowers sentences. \u00a0(Not that that happens often!) \u00a0In his dissent, Justice Scalia properly noted the uncertainty on this point created by the majority\u2019s opinion:<\/p>\n

Are we to conclude that, after the Sentencing Reform Act, \u00a7109 has no further application to criminal penalties, at least when statutory amendments lead to modification of the Guidelines? Portions of the Court\u2019s opinion could be understood to suggest that result, but the Court leaves us in suspense.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Cross posted at Life Sentences.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Last month, in\u00a0Dorsey v. United States\u00a0(No. 11-5683), the Supreme Court resolved an important circuit split on the interpretation of the Fair Sentencing Act of 2010. \u00a0The FSA softened the controversial mandatory minimum sentences for crack cocaine offenses that have been in place since 1986. \u00a0There\u2019s no question that crack offenders who committed their crimes after […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ocean_post_layout":"","ocean_both_sidebars_style":"","ocean_both_sidebars_content_width":0,"ocean_both_sidebars_sidebars_width":0,"ocean_sidebar":"","ocean_second_sidebar":"","ocean_disable_margins":"enable","ocean_add_body_class":"","ocean_shortcode_before_top_bar":"","ocean_shortcode_after_top_bar":"","ocean_shortcode_before_header":"","ocean_shortcode_after_header":"","ocean_has_shortcode":"","ocean_shortcode_after_title":"","ocean_shortcode_before_footer_widgets":"","ocean_shortcode_after_footer_widgets":"","ocean_shortcode_before_footer_bottom":"","ocean_shortcode_after_footer_bottom":"","ocean_display_top_bar":"default","ocean_display_header":"default","ocean_header_style":"","ocean_center_header_left_menu":"","ocean_custom_header_template":"","ocean_custom_logo":0,"ocean_custom_retina_logo":0,"ocean_custom_logo_max_width":0,"ocean_custom_logo_tablet_max_width":0,"ocean_custom_logo_mobile_max_width":0,"ocean_custom_logo_max_height":0,"ocean_custom_logo_tablet_max_height":0,"ocean_custom_logo_mobile_max_height":0,"ocean_header_custom_menu":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_family":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_subset":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_size":0,"ocean_menu_typo_font_size_tablet":0,"ocean_menu_typo_font_size_mobile":0,"ocean_menu_typo_font_size_unit":"px","ocean_menu_typo_font_weight":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_weight_tablet":"","ocean_menu_typo_font_weight_mobile":"","ocean_menu_typo_transform":"","ocean_menu_typo_transform_tablet":"","ocean_menu_typo_transform_mobile":"","ocean_menu_typo_line_height":0,"ocean_menu_typo_line_height_tablet":0,"ocean_menu_typo_line_height_mobile":0,"ocean_menu_typo_line_height_unit":"","ocean_menu_typo_spacing":0,"ocean_menu_typo_spacing_tablet":0,"ocean_menu_typo_spacing_mobile":0,"ocean_menu_typo_spacing_unit":"","ocean_menu_link_color":"","ocean_menu_link_color_hover":"","ocean_menu_link_color_active":"","ocean_menu_link_background":"","ocean_menu_link_hover_background":"","ocean_menu_link_active_background":"","ocean_menu_social_links_bg":"","ocean_menu_social_hover_links_bg":"","ocean_menu_social_links_color":"","ocean_menu_social_hover_links_color":"","ocean_disable_title":"default","ocean_disable_heading":"default","ocean_post_title":"","ocean_post_subheading":"","ocean_post_title_style":"","ocean_post_title_background_color":"","ocean_post_title_background":0,"ocean_post_title_bg_image_position":"","ocean_post_title_bg_image_attachment":"","ocean_post_title_bg_image_repeat":"","ocean_post_title_bg_image_size":"","ocean_post_title_height":0,"ocean_post_title_bg_overlay":0.5,"ocean_post_title_bg_overlay_color":"","ocean_disable_breadcrumbs":"default","ocean_breadcrumbs_color":"","ocean_breadcrumbs_separator_color":"","ocean_breadcrumbs_links_color":"","ocean_breadcrumbs_links_hover_color":"","ocean_display_footer_widgets":"default","ocean_display_footer_bottom":"default","ocean_custom_footer_template":"","ocean_post_oembed":"","ocean_post_self_hosted_media":"","ocean_post_video_embed":"","ocean_link_format":"","ocean_link_format_target":"self","ocean_quote_format":"","ocean_quote_format_link":"post","ocean_gallery_link_images":"on","ocean_gallery_id":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[30,28,74,68,122,24],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-17932","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-criminal-justice","category-criminal-law-process","category-federal-sentencing","category-judges-judicial-process","category-public","category-us-supreme-court","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17932","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17932"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17932\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17932"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17932"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/law.marquette.edu\/facultyblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17932"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}