Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/boundvolumes/529bv.pdf
Page Number: 610.0

529US2

Unit: $U52

[09-26-01 10:36:40] PAGES PGT: OPIN

Cite as: 529 U. S. 513 (2000)

535

Opinion of the Court

First, pointing to Blackstone’s Commentaries and a hand-
ful of state constitutions cited by Justice Chase in Calder,
see 3 Dall., at 391–392, the United States asserts that Justice
Chase simply got it wrong with his four categories. Black-
stone wrote: “There is still a more unreasonable method
than this, which is called making of laws ex post facto; when
after an action is committed, the legislator then for the ﬁrst
time declares it to have been a crime, and inﬂicts a pun-
.”
ishment upon the person who has committed it .
1 Commentaries on the Laws of England, at 46 (emphasis
in original). The ex post facto clauses in Ratiﬁcation-era
state constitutions to which Justice Chase cited are of a
piece.25 The United States directs our attention to the fact
that none of these deﬁnitions mentions Justice Chase’s
fourth category.

.

.

All of these sources, though, are perfectly consistent with
Justice Chase’s ﬁrst category of ex post facto laws. None of
them is incompatible with his four-category formulation, un-
less we accept the premise that Blackstone and the state
constitutions purported to express the exclusive deﬁnition of
an ex post facto law. Yet none appears to do so on its face.
And if those deﬁnitions were read as exclusive, the United

25 Massachusetts’ clause read as follows: “Laws made to punish for ac-
tions done before the existence of such laws, and which have not been
declared crimes by preceding laws, are unjust, oppressive, and inconsist-
ent with the fundamental principles of a free government.” Constitution
of Massachusetts, Pt. I, Art. 24 (1780), in 5 W. Swindler, Sources and Docu-
ments of United States Constitutions 95 (1975) (hereinafter Swindler).
The Constitutions of Maryland and North Carolina used identical words:
“That retrospective laws, punishing facts committed before the existence
of such laws, and by them only declared criminal, are oppressive, unjust,
and incompatible with liberty; wherefore no ex post facto law ought to be
made.” Maryland Constitution, A Declaration of Rights, Art. 15 (1776),
in 4 Swindler 373; North Carolina Constitution, A Declaration of Rights,
Art. 24 (1776), in 7 Swindler 403. And Delaware’s Declaration of Rights
and Fundamental Rules, Art. 11 (1776), in 2 Swindler 198, stated, “That
retrospective Laws, punishing Offenses committed before the Existence
of such Laws, are oppressive and unjust and ought not to be made.”