mikwut wrote:Res,It is your bad, and you keep making it worse.
You’ve been arguing how the statute works for pages now without any case law. It is completely disingenuous for you to demand that I come up with a case to support my argument from the plain language of the statute.
You’ven caught doing exactly what you were chastising others on the board for doing — not reading the statute. And now your’re blowing smoked to conceal the hypocrisy.
What you’ve failed to do, twice now, is explain why the definition is not relevant. And claiming an argument as circular is not the same as proving that it is.
Ok. I'll play. 1) because there is no case or precedent to establish your definition as actually including a member of congress. 2) Because in other areas of the code a "member of congress" is separately defined as a "United States Official." https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/115 So you would be trying to add, when your definition does not specifically state, an already defined party to a separate and different definition outside of what they are already defined as. That ambiguity is unconstitutional until defined clearer. You know that. That would require some kind of serious case law to include those definitions rather than the code just stating law enforcement officer and any united states official. And I am saying that doesn't exist. 3) The plain meaning of law enforcement officer does not comply with our understanding of congress. When interpreting statutes the plain meaning is given weight over ambiguity.
Further, the part of the code I linked is close in kind to the infraction at issue between us. It doesn't make sense for the separate definitions to exist there but not in your portion of the code. It would have simply included United States Officials.
mikwut
I'm not "playing." I'm showing that your condescending remarks to folks here are unwarranted because you did exactly what you accuse them of doing: failing to read the words of the statute. If you read all the words, it is perfectly clear that your narrow interpretation contradicts what the language actually says.
Let's recap:
The statute under discussion is 18 U.S.C. 1513(e), which states:
(e) Whoever knowingly, with the intent to retaliate, takes any action harmful to any "person," including interference with the lawful employment or livelihood of any "person," for providing to a "law enforcement officer" any truthful information relating to the commission or possible commission of any Federal "offense," shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than 10 years, or both.
Section 1515 defines certain terms as they are used in two specific sections: 1512 and 1513. I have placed quotation marks around the terms in section 1513 that are specifically defined in section 1515. They are easy to find in the online reference that EAllusion originally posted, because they are underlined as links. Click on the link; up pops the definition.
One of the terms specifically defined in the statute is "law enforcement officer." Here's how you originally defined it:
mikwut wrote: (d) Whoever knowingly, with the intent to retaliate, takes any action harmful to any person, including interference with the lawful employment or livelihood of any person, for providing to a law enforcement officer ----- no cops involved.
You defined "law enforcement officer" as "cops." But, because Congress provided a specific definition in the statute, you don't get to define it. You have to use the definition Congress provided:
18 U.S.C. 1515(4) wrote:(4) the term “law enforcement officer” means an officer or employee of the Federal Government, or a "person" authorized to act for or on behalf of the Federal Government or serving the Federal Government as an adviser or consultant—
(A) authorized under law to engage in or supervise the prevention, detection, investigation, or prosecution of an "offense"; or
(B) serving as a probation or pretrial services officer under this title;
Parsing out the language of the statute, a person qualifies as a "law enforcement officer" if he or she falls into one of three broad categories"
1. Officer or employee of the Federal Government;
2. A person authorized to act for or on behalf of the Federal Government;
3. A person serving the Federal Government as an adviser or consultant.
AND who satisfies either (A) or (B)
When combined, categories 1-3 are extremely broad. It would be hard to think of a broader set of terms for anyone connected with the federal government than the combination of those categories. Neither Congress members nor any other class of folks are identified as an exception.
When a term is not defined in a statute, we use the ordinary meaning of the word. With respect to number 1, the undefined term "officer or employee" covers anyone who draws a salary or wages from the government. Regardless of where the line is between officer of the federal government and employee of the federal government, the joint term includes members of Congress.
Number 2 is an even broader category. Clearly, a member of Congress is authorized to "act for or on behalf of the Federal Government." In fact, Congress is one of the three co-equal branch of the Federal government.
Using the ordinary, every day meaning of the words, Congress falls within the combination of numbers 1 and 2. To exclude Congress from that combination of broad categories, one would have to read exceptions into the language that Congress didn't put there.
Next, we turn to (A) or (B)
Congress is certainly authorized to investigate federal crimes, especially as part of its oversight of the executive branch. That's what Congress did with Whitewater. That's what it did when investigating Hillary Clinton's use of her own server. So, Congress qualifies under (A).
The plain language of the statute, when relying on the definitions Congress specifically elected to use, absolutely includes a member of Congress as a "law enforcement officer." Your claim that the statute is limited to "cops" is absurd.
Now, to specifically respond to your three points:
mikwut wrote:1) because there is no case or precedent to establish your definition as actually including a member of congress.
It's not my definition. It's Congress's definition that specifically applies to the law in question. Congress chose to use very broad terms, without restrictive definitions. If it had wanted to except itself from those broad terms, it could have. But it didn't. You've not provided any case saying that Congress intended to except itself from the broad language it chose to use.
mikwut wrote:2) Because in other areas of the code a "member of congress" is separately defined as a "United States Official." https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/115 So you would be trying to add, when your definition does not specifically state, an already defined party to a separate and different definition outside of what they are already defined as. That ambiguity is unconstitutional until defined clearer. You know that. That would require some kind of serious case law to include those definitions rather than the code just stating law enforcement officer and any united states official. And I am saying that doesn't exist.
This argument both ignores the plain language of the statute and seriously misrepresents what this other section of the statute does. Here's the language to which you refer:
(c) As used in this section, the term—
...
(4) “United States official” means the President, President-elect, Vice President, Vice President-elect, a Member of Congress, a member-elect of Congress, a member of the executive branch who is the head of a department listed in 5 U.S.C. 101, or the Director of the Central Intelligence Agency.
First, you simply ignore the words "as used in this section." "This section" is Section 115. It is in the Chapter 7 of the statute, which is entitled "Assault." The section we are discussing is Section 1513, with the applicable definitions listed in Section 1515. They are in the Chapter 73, titled "Obstruction of Justice." The two sections have nothing to do with each other (except that they define federal crimes). Both confine their definitions to a specific section or sections. There is no basis for drawing conclusions about the meaning of each section based on definitions found in the other.
Second, you misrepresent what Section 115 does. It does not define Congress as a United States Official to the exclusion of any other term. Rather, it creates a specific set of individuals and gives them the label "United States Officials" so that it does not have to repeat the laundry list of individuals in the body of the statute. It does not purport to claim that no other description or label other than "United States Official" can be used to describe or include members of Congress. In Section 115, Congress defined a term to apply to a limited set of individuals. In Section 1515, the Congress used extremely broad terms to encompass a wide range of individuals. The fact that Congress was included in a small, defined list in one section does not imply that Congress cannot be described in broader terms in a completely different section with a completely different purpose.
Broad language is not ambiguous just because Congress chose to use a narrower term in a different section of the law. Ambiguous requires more than one reasonable meaning. It is unreasonable to interpret the broad definition found in section 1515 as excluding Congress, when the plain language of the definition includes Congress. Nothing in the broad language in 1513 provides any basis for concluding that Congress intended to exempt itself from the broad definition in 1515. That Congress chose in a different portion of the statute to include Congress in a limited group of individuals is irrelevant to interpreting the broad definition in 1515.
Finally, as you know, an important part of statutory construction is avoiding an absurd interpretation of a statute. According to your interpretation, any person included in Section 115's definition of "United States Officials" must be excluded from the broad definition in Section 1515. But "Congress" is not the only person or entity included in that definition. Section 115 also applies to: the President, President-elect, Vice President, Vice President-elect, a Member of Congress, a member-elect of Congress, a member of the executive branch who is the head of a department listed in 5 U.S.C. 101, or the Director of the Central Intelligence Agency. Your interpretation would mean that a whistleblower is protected if he reports information to an Assistant Attorney General, but has no protection if he reports to the Attorney General. It is both nonsensical and antithetical to the broad protection provided by the plain language of the statute to adopt an interpretation that gives zero protection if a report is made to the U.S. Attorney General, but provides protection if the same report is made to anyone else in the Justice Department.
mikwut wrote:3) The plain meaning of law enforcement officer does not comply with our understanding of congress. When interpreting statutes the plain meaning is given weight over ambiguity.
Further, the part of the code I linked is close in kind to the infraction at issue between us. It doesn't make sense for the separate definitions to exist there but not in your portion of the code. It would have simply included United States Officials.
The plain meaning of a term that Congress expressly defines in the statute is irrelevant. That's first-year law school stuff. And I've already shown you that the two are not "close in kind." They deal with completely different subjects and were enacted in completely different pieces of legislation. It makes sense that Congress used a narrow term in section 115, because it wanted to protect a group of specified individuals. It didn't use the same definition in section 1515 because it wanted to extend protection to a broad class of individuals. Congress can and did use different definitions of different terms in the two sections. Noting in section 115 makes what Congress said ambiguous or unclear in any way.
Bottom line: as long as you read the definitions and refrain from torturing the rules of statutory construction, the plain language of section 1513 protections communications to Congress from retaliatory firing. To claim the exact opposite, as you did, is not just wrong -- it's absurd.
You owe several folks here an apology.