Can criminal law be retroactive in the United States? I was watching a segment from CNBC on YouTube and was surprised by the fact that the government intends to make the tax rate retroactive after the law is passed so that the new tax rates will apply to stocks owned before the law was passed. I was wondering if in criminal law, the passing of a law that makes punishment retroactive after the law was passed is also possible making it possible for past crimes to be punished in the United States.
No. This is black-letter constitutional law. From Article 1, section 9: No Bill of Attainder or ex post facto Law shall be passed.
The 5th amendment protects you from self-incrimination. If by possessing a firearm you are in violation of the law you cannot be compelled by law to reveal this information. If the police discover you have a gun in violation of the law you can be arrested and prosecuted for that offense. They cannot additionally prosecute you for not telling them about a gun. I thought there was a supreme court case about this specific situation, but the closest I can find for now is Haynes v. United States. The 7-1 majority held that people prohibited from possessing firearms cannot be compelled to register their firearms that they are possessing illegally. They are stopped by the police and asked this question. They answer truthfully. Then they can be arrested and prosecuted for the illegal possession of the gun. How does this square with the right not to self-incriminate? Or is asking the question considered to be a search? Police can generally ask whatever they want. If you choose to waive your 5th amendment rights, that's your mistake. Can the state prosecute this person for carrying the illegal weapon? The state can generally prosecute crimes it knows about. So yes, in this case they can. Suppose that next to the weapon a stash of illegal drugs is discovered, which was only found due to the action taken to secure the weapon. Can the state prosecute for that? The state can generally prosecute additional crimes it uncovers during investigations or other lawful actions. So yes, this can be prosecuted.
As far as I understand, no. In Canada, everyone has the constitutional right to be free from any cruel or unusual punishment, under the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms: Everyone has the right not to be subjected to any cruel and unusual treatment or punishment. If you're guilty of a crime, well then, you're guilty. You're either going to be tried in court (and if you were guilty of that crime, then you will probably be found guilty), or you will plead as such. Before being tried, you could try to plea bargain with the prosecutor: plead guilty and be sentenced to a lesser charge. Say you were charged with assault with a weapon or causing bodily harm. You thought that the punishment was cruel or unusual - and thought that the trial judge had made an error in the law. In this case, you can make an appeal to a higher court. There are also other things that can factor this: mitigating and aggravating circumstances. If many circumstances are mitigating, then it may make way for a lower punishment, and vice versa with aggravating circumstances, where punishment may be higher. Again, this is something where if something was erred, you can appeal to a higher court. However, just because you think a sentence is too long won't constitute cruel or unusual punishment. In R. vs Latimer, the Supreme Court of Canada ruled that minimum sentences, even if within special circumstances, will not constitute cruel or unusual punishment, and be upheld. Originally, he had been sentenced only to one year, based on the recommendation of the jury. He had been charged with second-degree murder. The Supreme Court reinstated the default punishment: A life sentence with no eligibility of parole for ten years.
There is no absolute rule in such cases. It is often a matter of negotiation between the state and federal authorities, and failing agreement, a matter of which authority has the prisoner in custody. Often the question of which crime is more serious or carries a longer sentence is an issue in such negotiations.
This story is plausible but the technical legal details are probably wrong. It is completely illegal to transport a pistol in a car in New York State if you do not fall into the list of exceptions § 265.01-b: A person is guilty of criminal possession of a firearm when he or she: (1) possesses any firearm or; (2) lawfully possesses a firearm prior to the effective date of the chapter of the laws of two thousand thirteen which added this section subject to the registration requirements of subdivision sixteen-a of section 400.00 of this chapter and knowingly fails to register such firearm pursuant to such subdivision. Since the question mentions the firearm locked in a glovebox I'm assuming it is a pistol. Comments have suggested and certain exemptions in the law suggest that there isn't a licensure or registration requirement for manual action long guns, but I have not found the specific section exempting them from the possession law. There is a long list of exemptions to the possession law in § 265.20, but the only one that could be applicable to a person just travelling through the state might be section 13: 13. Possession of pistols and revolvers by a person who is a nonresident of this state while attending or traveling to or from, an organized competitive pistol match or league competition... Notably, for a regular citizen they must have a New York State carry permit to possess a handgun, and their long guns must be registered with the state: 3. Possession of a pistol or revolver by a person to whom a license therefor has been issued as provided under section 400.00 or 400.01 of this chapter or possession of a weapon as defined in paragraph (e) or (f) of subdivision twenty-two of section 265.00 of this article which is registered pursuant to paragraph (a) of subdivision sixteen-a of section 400.00 of this chapter or is included on an amended license issued pursuant to section 400.00 of this chapter. Neither applies to someone simply travelling through the state to another state who hasn't fulfilled the appropriate license or registry requirements. What may apply, however, is the federal Firearm Owners Protection Act, which in part codifies 18 U.S. Code § 926A: Notwithstanding any other provision of any law or any rule or regulation of a State or any political subdivision thereof, any person who is not otherwise prohibited by this chapter from transporting, shipping, or receiving a firearm shall be entitled to transport a firearm for any lawful purpose from any place where he may lawfully possess and carry such firearm to any other place where he may lawfully possess and carry such firearm if, during such transportation the firearm is unloaded, and neither the firearm nor any ammunition being transported is readily accessible or is directly accessible from the passenger compartment of such transporting vehicle: Provided, That in the case of a vehicle without a compartment separate from the driver’s compartment the firearm or ammunition shall be contained in a locked container other than the glove compartment or console. The notwithstanding in this case preempts state law and affirms that transporting a firearm between two states that allow the person to carry that firearm cannot be a crime assuming they meet the statutory requirements on carrying the firearm and ammunition. However, he failed to meet those requirements by keeping the firearm in the glove box, which the federal law specifically does not protect. Therefore, NY State law is allowed to apply and he can be charged with possession without a license under NY State law. The part about whether or not he stayed overnight being a distinction may be a retelling error or conflating this law with similar state laws that allow transporting firearms that are inaccessible in the vehicle as long as the vehicle doesn't stop in the state beyond minor pit stops (e.g. for gas).
However, in the last 233 years, only a handful of people have been prosecuted for violating this law. The census bureau has noticed that a more effective way to get everyone counted is to follow up in person if someone neglects to respond to the questionnaire. Once they follow up and the person has responded, there's no longer a basis for prosecuting. What is the point of one of the oldest laws, in which some people have cared enough to amend, but not enough to actually enforce? The possibility of prosecution is presumably thought to increase the response rate even if virtually nobody is ever prosecuted. The law also serves as a formal statement by congress that responding to the census is important, even if the executive doesn't prosecute people for failing to do so. Another thing to consider is that an element of the offense specified in 13 USC 221 is refusal or willful neglect. Without evidence of an affirmative refusal to respond, the prosecutor would need evidence of willfulness, which goes to state of mind, and that is notoriously difficult to prove. Any defendant who claims to have intended to respond but for chronic forgetfulness would introduce reasonable doubt unless the prosecutor had something to show that the defendant intentionally refrained from responding.
The "point" of including bank-interest income on your tax return rather than having the government automatically deduct what it feels that you would owe is that the government is not legally empowered to take money away from you in that fashion. The government is legal empowered to compel you to pay your taxes, and there are numerous rules enacted as law or as a consequence of laws passed. You can read the various relevant laws here. There simply is no general law that says that banks must withhold taxes on interest. There might be a specific case when an entity is subject to backup withholding (as a response to a taxpayer not following certain rules). There are also special rules regarding non-resident alien withholding, which could require interest withholding. Apart from the intrinsic political unpopularity of imposing new withholding requirements on people, it is difficult to compute the correct amount to withhold, since not all interest is taxable. In theory, a set of rules could be constructed to require withholding of interest income, if Congress were to pass a law similar to 26 USC 3402.
As @cpast says in their comment, these are not equivalent punishments, the fine is for the lower end of the scale where incarceration is not warranted and the maximum gaol term is for the most egregious cases. That said, your supposition is almost certainly correct; statutes tend to be a &quot;set and forget&quot; thing, legislatures have a lot to do and going back to old laws to update fines in line with inflation is probably not high on their list of priorities. In order to overcome this problem all jurisdictions in Australia have adopted the Penalty Unit; fines in statutes are stated as a certain number of penalty units and the value of a penalty unit is set in various ways that usually do not require a vote in parliament.