Ellingburg v. United States · ¶56
Calder itself confirms this understanding. Justice Chase distinguished crimes not with nominally civil laws enforced by the sovereign, but with laws that merely “secure[d] pri vate rights,” like contract laws. 3 Dall., at 390. Justices Chase and Iredell used “crime” interchangeably with “offence.” Ibid.; id., at 400 (opinion of Iredell, J.). Justices Chase and Paterson said that their definitions tracked Blackstone’s. See id., at 391 (opinion of Chase, J.) (“Sir Wil liam Blackstone, in his commentaries, considers an ex post facto law precisely in the same light I have done.”); id., at 396 (opinion of Paterson, J.) (similar). Justice Iredell explained in a contemporaneous opinion that the Ex Post Facto Clauses could be limited to crimes because “there . . . is little reason to apprehend a legislative interference for the sake of unjustly transferring property from one man to another.”…Read in context ›
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