H.R. 5948: Rodney J. Johnson Community Protection Act Sponsor: Lampson (D-TX)
Official Title: A bill to amend section 274 of the Immigration and Nationality Act to increase penalties for unlawfully bringing in and harboring aliens with prior felony convictions under Federal law.
Status: 5/1/2008: Introduced and referred to the House Judiciary Committee
Commentary: This bill would double the maximum criminal penalties, including imprisonment of up to 20 years rather than 10 years under current law, for smuggling aliens into the United States when such smuggling was for commercial advantage or private financial gain and the alien was subsequently convicted of a felony under federal law.
Commentary: This proposed amendment would create a criminal offense, punishable by fines, for flight schools that knowingly provide flight training to aliens who have not notified the Secretary of Homeland Security of their intent to study aviation or whom the Secretary of Homeland Security has determined may not study aviation because they present a risk to aviation or national security.
H.R. 5923: Patients’ Health Care Reform Act Sponsor: Shadegg (R-AZ)
Original Sponsors: Mrs. Musgrave, Mr. Wamp, Mr. Akin, Mr. Campbell Of California, Mr. David Davis Of Tennessee, Mr. Kingston, Mr. Gingrey, Mr. Marchant, Mr. Issa, Mr. Pence, Mr. Franks Of Arizona, Mr. Fortuño, Mr. Pitts, Mr. Wilson Of South Carolina, Mr. Brown Of South Carolina, Mr. Bartlett Of Maryland, Mr. Souder, and Mr. Feeney
Official Title: A bill to amend the Internal Revenue Code of 1986 to allow individuals a refundable and advanceable credit against income tax for health insurance costs, to allow employees who elect not to participate in employer subsidized health plans an exclusion from gross income for employer payments in lieu of such participations, and for other purposes.
Status: 4/29/2008: Introduced and referred to the House Education and Labor, House Energy and Commerce, and House Ways and Means Committees
Commentary: This bill would allow businesses and organizations to offer health insurance coverage through new mechanisms known as “association health plans.” The bill would create a criminal offense for willfully misrepresentating any other kind of health insurance plan or arrangement as an association health plan. Violations would be punishable by imprisonment of up to 5 years and criminal fines. View More » 05/08/2008 02:40 PM
H.R. 5955: Making Health Care More Affordable Act of 2008
Sponsor: Walberg (R-MI)
Original Sponsors: Mrs. Musgrave, Mr. Wamp, Mr. Akin, Mr. Campbell Of California, Mr. David Davis Of Tennessee, Mr. Kingston, Mr. Gingrey, Mr. Marchant, Mr. Issa, Mr. Pence, Mr. Franks Of Arizona, Mr. Fortuño, Mr. Pitts, Mr. Wilson Of South Carolina, Mr. Brown Of South Carolina, Mr. Bartlett Of Maryland, Mr. Souder, and Mr. Feeney
Official Title: To provide for comprehensive health reform.
Status: 5/1/2008: Introduced and referred to the House Education and Labor, House Energy and Commerce, House Judiciary, House Ways and Means Committees
Commentary: This bill would allow businesses and organizations to offer health insurance coverage through new mechanisms known as “association health plans.” The bill would create a criminal offense for willfully misrepresenting any other kind of health insurance plan or arrangement as an association health plan. Violations would be punishable by imprisonment of up to 5 years and criminal fines.
H.R. 5915: Screening Applied Fairly and Equitably to Truckers Act of 2008 Sponsor: Lundgren (R-CA)
Official Title: A bill to amend the Homeland Security Act of 2002 to require motor vehicle operators transporting security sensitive material in commerce to obtain a transportation security card from the Secretary of Homeland Security, and for other purposes.
Status: 4/29/08: Introduced; referred to the Committee on Homeland Security
Commentary: This bill would criminalize willful transportation by shippers and motor vehicle operators of “security sensitive materials,” as enumerated by the Secretary of Homeland Security, without a “transportation security card” obtained from the Department of Homeland Security. Violations would be punishable by imprisonment of up to 5 years (10 when the violation results in a “transportation security incident”), criminal fines, and civil penalties of up to $100,000 per violation.
Over-Criminalization of Social and Economic Conduct
The origin of modern criminal law can be traced
to early feudal times. From its inception, the criminal law expressed both
a moral and a practical judgment about the societal consequences of certain
activity: to be a crime, the law required that an individual must both cause
(or attempt to cause) a wrongful injury and do so with some form of malicious
intent. Classically, lawyers capture this insight in two
principles...
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