Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/boundvolumes/529bv.pdf
Page Number: 606

529US2

Unit: $U52

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

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

531

Opinion of the Court

wick’s bill of attainder, which permitted the House of Com-
mons to convict him with less evidence than was otherwise
required, Texas’ retrospective application of the amendment
to Article 38.07 permitted petitioner to be convicted with
less than the previously required quantum of evidence.
It
is true, of course, as the Texas Court of Appeals observed,
that “[t]he statute as amended does not increase the punish-
ment nor change the elements of the offense that the State
963 S. W. 2d, at 836. But that observation
must prove.”
simply demonstrates that the amendment does not ﬁt within
Calder’s ﬁrst and third categories. Likewise, the dissent’s
remark that “Article 38.07 does not establish an element
of the offense,” post, at 559, only reveals that the law does
not come within Calder’s ﬁrst category. The fact that the
amendment authorizes a conviction on less evidence than
previously required, however, brings it squarely within the
fourth category.

V

The fourth category, so understood, resonates harmoni-
ously with one of the principal interests that the Ex Post
Facto Clause was designed to serve, fundamental justice.21

see also post, at 561, n. 6 (dissenting opinion). The trouble with that ar-
gument is that the same was true in Fenwick’s case. The relevant stat-
ute there required the “Testimony of Two lawfull Witnesses either both
of them to the same Overtact or one of them to one and another of them
to another Overtact of the same Treason.” See n. 15, supra (emphasis
added).

21 The Clause is, of course, also aimed at other concerns, “namely, that
legislative enactments give fair warning of their effect and permit individ-
uals to rely on their meaning until explicitly changed,” Miller v. Florida,
482 U. S. 423, 430 (1987) (internal quotation marks omitted), and at re-
inforcing the separation of powers, see Weaver v. Graham, 450 U. S. 24,
29, n. 10 (1981). But those are not its only aims, and the absence of a
reliance interest is not an argument in favor of abandoning the category
itself.
If it were, the same conclusion would follow for Calder’s third cate-
gory (increases in punishment), as there are few, if any, reliance interests
in planning future criminal activities based on the expectation of less se-
vere repercussions.