Statutory Construction in the Criminal Law Context: Selected Principles and Examples

Criminal law marks a boundary between conduct that society deems permissible and behavior that it deems worthy of punishment. Those who cross this line may be subject to penalty and social disapproval. In addition to punishment, transgressors may face wide-ranging public and private collateral consequences, such as limitations in the ability to exercise voting or gun-possession rights, and difficulty in obtaining employment. Defendants in criminal cases sometimes raise legal challenges during their proceedings. These challenges may concern issues specific to the defendant’s case, such as whether the evidence presented is sufficient to establish guilt or whether that evidence was lawfully obtained. More relevant to lawmakers, defendants may contest the criminal statutes under which they are charged, arguing that the statutes are legally deficient or misapplied to conduct that the law was not intended to cover. For example, some defendants claim that certain criminal statutes are “void for vagueness” because they are unclear in that they fail to provide fair notice of what conduct is prohibited. In other instances, defendants may argue that applying a particular statute to their circumstances exceeds Congress’s intent or conflicts with constitutional principles. This report addresses substantive principles—generally referred to as tools of statutory construction—that the Supreme Court has utilized to review the validity and scope of criminal statutes. The report begins by defining selected tools of construction in the criminal context, offering examples of their use from historic and modern cases. The report then summarizes cases from the 2022, 2023, and 2024 Supreme Court terms in which the Court applied these principles to challenged criminal laws. The discussion and examples are not comprehensive but are representative in nature. The report closes with considerations for Congress.