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Page Number: 13.0

10 

UNITED STATES v. TAYLOR 

Opinion of the Court 

whether known or unknown to anyone at the time.  It’s a 
reading that would defy our usual rule of statutory inter-
pretation  that  a  law’s  terms  are  best  understood  by  “the 
company [they] kee[p ].”  Gustafson v. Alloyd Co., 513 U. S. 
561, 575 (1995).

Beyond that clue lies another.  Next door to the elements 
clause  Congress  included  the  residual  clause.  Under  its 
terms, “crimes of violence” were defined to embrace offenses 
that,  “by  [their]  nature,  involv[e]  a  substantial  risk  that
physical force . . . may  be used” against a person or prop-
erty.  § 924(c)(3)(B).  Pretty plainly, that language called for 
an abstract inquiry into whether a particular crime, by its
nature, poses or presents a substantial risk (or “threat”) of
force being used.  See Davis, 588 U. S., at ___–___ (slip op., 
at 5–7).  Of course, this Court eventually held the residual 
clause to be unconstitutionally vague.  Id., at ___ (slip op., 
at 24).  But if the government’s view of the elements clause
caught on, it would only wind up effectively replicating the
work formerly performed by the residual clause, collapsing
the distinction between them, and perhaps inviting similar 
constitutional  questions  along  the  way.    It’s  an  outcome 
that would (again) defy our usual rules of statutory inter-
pretation—this time because we do not lightly assume Con-
gress adopts two separate clauses in the same law to per-
form the same work.  See, e.g., Mackey v. Lanier Collection 
Agency & Service, Inc., 486 U. S. 825, 839, n. 14 (1988). 

C 
Heaping alternative upon alternative, the government’s
final  theory  accepts  that  a  conviction  under  the  elements
clause  requires  a  communicated  threat  of  force.    But,  the 
argument goes, most attempted Hobbs Act robbery prose-
cutions involve exactly that.  Indeed, the government faults
Mr.  Taylor  for  failing  to  identify  a  single  case  in  which  it 
has prosecuted someone for attempted Hobbs Act robbery
without proving a communicated threat.