What are the US federal crimes and penalties against public insurrection? Defining broadly public insurrection as impeding the workings of US government or its officials, threatening them, taking up violence against them, or trying to overthrow the government, are there any specific such criminal statutes and if so what are their associated penalties if any? Are there multiple such statutes?
There are literally hundreds of such laws. Most of them (perhaps all, if we exclude firearms-related crimes in Title 26) are contained in Title 18 of the US Code, part I. The problem is that your definition of "public insurrection" is too broad, since it would include lying to federal agents (a crime), insofar as the reason for 18 USC 1001 is to prevent impeding federal investigations by giving them false information. Assaulting a federal agent impedes government and is a crime. There is pretty much a federal version of any state-level crime of violence. There is the riot act, and a specific law against insurrection and rebellion. Chapter 115 is probably the most relevant: this is where the various "overthrowing the government" laws are.
You have a couple major misconceptions about US law. First, crimes against the person are generally punished at the state level. States are not restricted to any sort of enumerated powers, and can pass any law they want to promote the general welfare unless there's a reason they can't. This is called the "general police power," and it lets them make everything from contract law to laws against murder. The federal government has to justify what gives it the authority to pass a law, and cities and counties have to justify their authority with state law or a state constitution, but a state government never has to preemptively justify why they have the authority to pass a law. States are especially not limited to powers listed in the federal constitution. The US Constitution sets up the federal government. State governments are set up by state constitutions, and derive their authority directly from the consent of the people of the state exercising their right to democratic self-determination. The only powers the US Constitution gives to states are minor technical powers involving state-federal relations (e.g. deciding how their presidential electors are appointed). But as I said, they aren't generally limited to any sort of enumerated powers by their state constitution either. Even the federal government isn't limited to "protecting rights listed in amendments." That's very little of what it does, in fact. Congress has powers listed (for the most part) in Article I and Article IV. It can pass laws banning murder in DC because Article I lets it exercise exclusive jurisdiction (meaning general police power) over DC and over federal enclaves. Article IV lets it exercise general police power over US territories, and pass laws regarding other federal property (I think it has a general police power there too, at least according to current law). The Necessary and Proper clause gives Congress the power to protect its own operations by, for instance, criminalizing the murder of a federal judge. Etc. Where there isn't a clear thing that lets the feds regulate something, they can probably get away with cramming "in or affecting interstate or foreign commerce" in the law, secure in the knowledge that practically everything affects interstate commerce. I'm not sure where you got the idea that laws are passed exclusively to enforce rights protected by the Constitution. They are not. They are not passed primarily for that purpose. Such laws do exist (e.g. deprivation of rights under color of law, which was passed pursuant to the 14th Amendment), but they're protecting you from government infringement of that right.
@Dale M is basically correct, but fudges a bit on the process. The court issuing the order would issue an order to show cause to a government official who is alleged by the person who sought the order to have violated the order after having received legal notice (i.e. service) of the order. If that individual fails to appear at the appointed time and place in the order to show cause, a warrant issues for that individual's arrest. If that individual does appear, the allegedly contemptuous individual is read their rights and a hearing date is set. At the hearing, if the person appears, the person seeking the contempt finding (or some other attorney appointed by the court) prosecutes the case and if the person is found in contempt, then contempt sanctions issue. If they do not appear, a warrant issues for their arrest and a hearing is held on the merits promptly following that arrest. An individual can also be ordered to show cause in an official capacity in which case the contempt sanctions would be imposed against the organization rather than the individual. Usually, in federal court, the U.S. Marshal's office has primary responsibility for arresting people on contempt warrants. The U.S. Marshal's office primarily reports to the judicial branch, although strictly speaking, it is part of the Justice Department, and ultimately reports to the Attorney-General. There are actually two kinds of contempt - remedial and punitive. Remedial contempt sanction can include indefinite incarceration or a fine (often a per day fine) until the violation of the order of the court ceases and is allowed only when it is possible to comply with the order going forward. Punitive contempt has a sanction comparable to a misdemeanor conviction and applies in cases where the goal is to punish someone for a past violation of a court order whether or not it is possible to comply going forward. (Both of these are examples of "indirect contempt", i.e. violations of court orders that take place outside the courtroom. A different summary process called "direct contempt" applies when someone misbehaves in the presence of the court - this is summary incarceration or fine without a trial on the spot for disrespecting the dignity of the court in the courtroom.) Established practice is to direct a contempt order at the lowest level official necessary to remedy the violation of the order. There are a few examples in living memory of cabinet members being held in contempt, however (e.g. the Secretary of Interior, with regard to Indian Trust fund litigation), and keep in mind that in the case of remedial contempt an official can purge the contempt and be released from any sanction by resigning from office, after which the official no longer has the ability to comply. I am not aware of any instance in which the President of the United States has personally been held in contempt of court, but I am also not aware of any authority that specifically prohibits a court from holding the President in contempt of court. While contempt is the only "hard" remedy for a violation of a court order, the bureaucratic structure of the federal government is also set up in a manner that once a court order definitively resolves a legal issue, the higher ups in a federal agency are supposed to take all reasonable actions to insure that their subordinates follow that order (and they are themselves subject to contempt sanctions if they fail to do so). And, keep in mind that most of the people in the chain of command are civil servants with legal protections from unlawful employment actions hired on a merit basis, not political appointees, and that lots of the people in the chain of command are also members of unions that provide individual employees with the ability to fight wrongful employment action from a superior for violating a court order. In particular, the top lawyers in the executive branch would in ordinary times direct government employees to follow a clear court order and to cease and desist from explicitly disobeying one. Among other things, the courts could probably deny lawyers who refused to do so the right to practice law in federal court. But, usually things never reach this point. Then again, we are living in interesting times. There are about 670 political appointee positions in the executive branch, many of which are currently vacant and less than a dozen of which would be relevant to any given dispute in any case. There are about a million, civilian, non-defense department, non-postal service employees in the United States government, of which perhaps 100,000 or so are in the Department of Homeland Security and fewer are in the CBP. As far as I know, the CBP political appointees from the Obama administration have resigned and a replacement has not been confirmed by the U.S. Senate yet (there has been a Department of Homeland Security appointee confirmed if I recall correctly), and there are only a few people in the agency that political appointees can hire without either receiving Senate confirmation or using the merit based hiring process for civil servants (which takes a while, especially given an executive order imposing a hiring freeze). So, realistically, we have a case where the acting head of the CBP is probably a GS-15 or Senior Executive Service grade civil servant, rather than a political appointee, at the moment, who was hired as a civil servant many years ago, who is doing his (or her) best to follow the less than clear guidance he is receiving from his superiors and government lawyers (perhaps errantly). There could also be remedies in the form of declaratory judgment. The Court could declare as a matter of law on a case by case basis that, for example, Fatima Jones is not deportable and is lawfully within the United States and is entitled to be released from custody. This specific finding as to an individual would be very hard for the administration to escape sanction for. And, the Court could also declare that the entire executive order, at least as applied, is invalid (e.g. for failure to comply with the administrative procedures act, or for failing to include an exception for contrary court orders) or is unconstitutional.
Part answer to Q1: Is my conceptualization correct? No, insofar that your Points 1 to 4 are all &quot;completely illegal&quot; regardless of how the authorities deal with them, and the rest are not, on the face of it, crimes but presumably civil wrongs (which can be dealt with by, for example, fines or restraint / good behaviour / banning orders etc without one having a &quot;criminal conviction&quot;). Also: if the authorities, for whatever reason, decide against dealing with crime then it hasn't been &quot;decriminalised&quot; - that is the remit of the law makers, not the law enforcers. It's still a crime but with a lower political/ operational etc priority.
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.
Supporting a secessionist movement is protected by the First Amendment. Terrorism, in the name of a secessionist movement or otherwise, or support of terrorism is a federal offense. See 18 USC 2339A and 2339B. The latter applies to foreign terrorist organizations, the former applies to to anything in violation of a specific list of crimes (§§32, 37, 81, 175, 229, 351, 831, 842(m) or (n), 844(f) or (i), 930(c), 956, 1091, 1114, 1116, 1203, 1361, 1362, 1363, 1366, 1751, 1992, 2155, 2156, 2280, 2281, 2332, 2332a, 2332b, 2332f, 2340A, 2442 of Title 18, and a few other things). Advocating secesion is not a crime, so supporting the advocacy of secession – in the US – is not a crime. §2339B determines what terrorist-organization status via 18 USC 1189, which is basically a finding by the Secretary of State, in consultation with the Secretary of the Treasury and the Attorney General that &quot;the organization threatens the security of United States nationals or the national security of the United States&quot;. Here is a current list. Advocating the forceful overthrow of the US government or that of any state or lower political subdivision is a crime under 18 USC 2385, likewise abetting, advising, or teaching the duty, necessity, desirability, or propriety of such overthrow.
united-states An ex post facto law criminalizes conduct after the fact that was legal at the time, something that is prohibited under U.S. constitutional law. But, as the question states: my question is about actions that were illegal and then had changes made to them. If something is a crime in 2015 and this criminal law is violated, and the conduct is then legalized in 2016, the conduct committed while it was a crime does not cease to be punishable as a crime and may be punished criminally. Often a judge would consider the fact that the conduct was later legalized when evaluating the seriousness of the crime at a post-legalization sentencing, but a judge is not required to do so. A significant number of pardons and commutations of criminal sentences by Presidents and Governors in the U.S. involve people convicted of crimes for conduct that is now legal or is now punished less severely. But pardons and commutations are purely discretionary. As an aside, France has constitutional protections that give newly lenient treatment of crimes retroactive effect, but the United States does not.
None, if the intention is merely trespassing, unlike burglary which requires intent to steal, commit criminal damage, or inflict grevious bodily harm or if the building is a protected site - neither of which isn't evident from the question. Note, for both offences, the actus reus is entry - there is no requirement for any form of &quot;breaking&quot; Further to ohwilleke's comment, unless the lock is damaged or destroyed etc, then there is no offence of criminal damage