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Page Number: 26.0

6 

FISCHER v. UNITED STATES 

JACKSON, J., concurring 

justice.”  Ante, at 15.3  Meanwhile, many States have done 
just  that.  See  J.  Decker,  The  Varying  Parameters  of  Ob-
struction  of  Justice  in  American  Criminal  Law,  65  La. 
L. Rev. 49, 77, and n. 236 (2004) (collecting statutes).4  The 
drafters of the Model Penal Code, too, proposed such a gen-
eral obstruction crime. See ALI, Model Penal Code §242.1,
p. 201 (1980) (“A person commits a misdemeanor if he pur-
posely obstructs, impairs or perverts the administration of 
law or other governmental function by force, violence, phys-
ical interference or obstacle, breach of official duty, or any 
other unlawful act”).

Given that Congress has never before passed a similarly 
broad obstruction law when others have long existed, it is 
highly unlikely that Congress intended for subsection (c)(2) 
to  establish  a  first-of-its-kind  general  federal  obstruction 
crime.  Nothing in the enactment history of  §1512(c) sug-
gests that Congress believed that it was creating an all-en-
compassing  statute  that  would  obviate  the  need  for  any 
other obstruction prohibitions.

This conclusion is further reinforced by the fact that, un-
like §1512(c)(2), nearly all of the broad, all-purpose obstruc-
tion statutes that various States have enacted are classified 
as misdemeanors.  See, e.g., Colo. Rev. Stat. §18–8–102(3) 
(2023); Ohio Rev. Code Ann. 2921.31(B) (Lexis 2024).  As a 

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3 That  is  not  to  say,  of  course,  that  Congress  could  not  enact  such  a 
statute if it so chose.  “We have traditionally exercised restraint in as-
sessing the reach of a federal criminal statute . . . out of deference to the
prerogatives of Congress,” United States v. Aguilar, 515 U. S. 593, 600 
(1995), not because broad criminal proscriptions are beyond the scope of
Congress’s power. 

4 See also, e.g., Colo. Rev. Stat. §18–8–102(1) (2023) (“A person commits
obstructing government operations if he intentionally obstructs, impairs, 
or hinders the performance of a governmental function by a public serv-
ant, by using or threatening to use violence, force, or physical interfer-
ence  or  obstacle”);  Ohio  Rev.  Code  Ann.  §2921.31(A)  (Lexis  2024)  (“No 
person . . . shall do any act that hampers or impedes a public official in
the performance of the public official’s lawful duties”).