Ellingburg v. United States · ¶48

When Calder said that the Ex Post Facto Clauses apply only to laws imposing punishment for crimes, it was referring to an established category of laws. A crime meant a “public wrong,” which is an injury to the sovereign in its sovereign capacity. Calder therefore encompassed offenses against the sovereign regardless of whether they were nominally criminal or civil. And punishment simply referred to the law's coercive sanction—meaning a traditional deprivation of life, liberty, or property—redressing that public wrong. Applying this understanding would restore the Clauses to their proper role without the problems attendant to the more recent precedents.

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