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Page Number: 46

14 

UNITED STATES v. HANSEN 

JACKSON, J., dissenting 

appears to criminally punish someone who merely encour-
ages or induces a civil violation.6 
  That feature of the provision does not sit easily with its 
categorization  as  a  solicitation  or  facilitation  statute,  be-
cause, ordinarily, a person may only be held criminally lia-
ble for aiding and abetting or solicitation when the under-
lying offense is itself a crime.  Aiding-and-abetting liability 
is “a centuries-old view of culpability: that a person may be 
responsible for a crime he has not personally carried out if 
he helps another to complete its commission.”  Rosemond v. 
United States, 572 U. S. 65, 70 (2014) (citing J. Hawley & 
M. McGregor, Criminal Law 81 (1899)); see also 18 U. S. C. 
§2(a)  (the  general  federal  aiding-and-abetting  statute, 
providing  that  someone  who  “aids,  abets,  counsels,  com-
mands,  induces  or  procures”  the  commission  of  a  federal 
crime “is punishable as a principal”).  As for solicitation, at 
common  law,  the  solicited  offense  had  to  be  a  felony  or  a 
serious misdemeanor; otherwise, “the solicitor [was] guilty 
of  no  offense.”    1  J.  Ohlin,  Wharton’s  Criminal  Law  §9:2 
(16th ed. 2021) (Wharton’s).  Today, “in some jurisdictions, 
the offense solicited may be a felony or a misdemeanor; but 
in others, it can only be a felony”—either way, though, the 
underlying offense must be criminal.  Ibid. (footnotes omit-
ted); see also 18 U. S. C. §373 (the general federal solicita-
tion  statute,  which  is  limited  to  the  solicitation  of  violent 
felonies). 
  Here,  by  contrast,  the  encouragement  provision  on  its 
face appears to permit a person to be punished as a felon 
for merely encouraging a civil violation.  Thus, the statute 

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6 Hansen takes issue with this feature of the statute, arguing that the 
“ ‘speech  integral  to  criminal  conduct’  exception”  to  the  First  Amend-
ment’s  protection of  free  speech  “does  not  permit  the  criminal  punish-
ment of speech encouraging only a civil law violation.”  Brief for Respond-
ent  39.    The  majority  declines  to  address  this  argument,  leaving  it 
available in future as-applied challenges to this and other statutes.  Ante, 
at 19, n. 5, 20.