Ellingburg v. United States · ¶60

Calder's understanding secures Ex Post Facto Clause protection in a wide range of contexts involving nominally civil laws. Those contexts include civil proceedings seeking fines for public offenses. See, e. g., Army Corps of Engineers v. Hawkes Co., 578 U. S. 590, 600 (2016) (describing “civil penalties of up to $37,500 for each day [the challenger] violated the Act”). They include enforcement proceedings brought by administrative agencies. See Axon Enterprise, Inc. v. FTC, 598 U. S. 175, 196 (2023) (Thomas, J., concurring) (describing the 20th-century rise of such proceedings). And they include municipal sanctions like speeding tickets. “If one were to commit a minor traffic offense at a time the offense was to be punished by a $25 fine, and the government were to then amend the statute and impose a fine of $1,000,000 dollars, it would be nonsensical to treat that fine as non-punitive…

preliminary print (page proof)
Source edition
Passage preview. Read in context for the complete text, notes and references.