Can a USA federal employee use a prostitute in a Las Vegas where it is legal? We got into an interesting debate at work today after someone joked that a prostitute would be cheaper than dating someone. The crutch of the debate was whether Federal employees or military could use a prostitute if they went to Las Vegas. Prostitution is legal in certain parts of LV. However, the debate was whether there was a Federal law that would prohibit travelling to another state for the express purpose of using a prostitute. At least one person suggested it was illegal due to human trafficking's laws, though I'm not convinced that is accurate. So, could a Federal employee legally travel to LV with the intent of using a prostitute there? As a related question is it possible that it's legal, i.e. I won't end up in jail, but would be grounds for termination from Federal employment; though I realize the latter question may be more policy than a legal question.
Short Answer It is not illegal for a federal employee or anyone else, who is not subject to the Uniform Code of Military Justice, to travel to Nevada for the purposes of engaging the services of a prostitute in the counties of Nevada (Clark County where Las Vegas, Nevada is located is not one such county) where it is legal. But, this is an offense under Article 134 of the Uniform Code of Military Justice applicable primarily to U.S. military personnel while serving in that capacity, even in cases where prostitution is legal under local law and the service member is not married. Long Answer Legal Prostitution In Nevada, In General As another answer correctly notes that in Nevada: Clark County, the county in which Las Vegas is located, has made prostitution illegal. . . . You also can't do it in Reno (it's illegal in Washoe County) and the nearby independent city of Carson City (Nevada State Capital). In fact, the law only permits counties with a population of 70,000 or less to do it per county law. And before you ask, you can't go to Rachel, Nevada (closest settlement to Area 51) for some extraterrestrial ladies of the night as well as Lincoln County, while qualifying for legalized prostitution . . . prohibits it. Of the 16 counties in Nevada, only 10 allow prostitution, all of which must be done through regulated licensed brothels only. Even then, only 8 counties have at least one active brothel in operation. Civilian Legal Considerations In The U.S. Not Involving International Travel It seems as if the concern of the original post might be with the Mann Act. The Mann Act (also known as the White-Slave Traffic Act of 1910) is a federal law that criminalizes the transportation of “any woman or girl for the purpose of prostitution or debauchery, or for any other immoral purpose.” (Source) This has been revised in a manner that, among other things, is now gender-neutral and limiting it to circumstances in which the act for which the prostitute is transported is illegal. It was the first federal human trafficking law in the U.S. This act applies to transporting the prostitute across state lines, not the prostitute's customer. Closer to the mark is the Travel Act: The Travel Act or International Travel Act of 1961, 18 U.S.C. § 1952, is a Federal criminal statute which forbids the use of the U.S. mail, or interstate or foreign travel, for the purpose of engaging in certain specified criminal acts. But, since the travel would be for the purpose of an act that is legal at its destination, it wouldn't apply. International treaties on sex tourism are inapplicable to domestic travel, and I don't try to analyze their applicability here. None of these relevant laws treat military personnel or federal employees differently. Prosecutions Under The Uniform Code of Military Justice The Uniform Code of Military Justice provides an internal means of prosecuting military service members who are currently serving and a small number of other persons, via courts-martial, which are quasi-criminal proceedings with quasi-criminal punishments. Article 134 of the UCMJ is its general provision which is a catch-all article barring anything &quot;of a nature to bring discredit upon the armed forces&quot;, and also certain unenumerated offenses which are illegal under local law where the offense is committed, or under federal law. Article 134 encompasses many sub-offenses which are enumerated in the Manual For Courts-Martial but not in the statutory language of the UCMJ itself. One of the offenses which the Article 134 of the Uniform Code of Military Justice (UCMJ) in the United States prohibits is adultery (which only a handful of U.S. states do and Nevada does not), so this would be an activity, if carried out, that would be subject to court-martial for a married member of the military who is currently serving in the military and thus subject to court-martial jurisdiction. Adultery prosecutions under the UCMJ are reasonably common even now. (A lesser included offense of adultery under the UCMJ is &quot;wrongful cohabitation&quot; which is akin to adultery and bigamy but does not require a showing a sexual intercourse.) Also, as noted in the comments to the question, while patronizing a prostitute is not a specific offense in the UCMJ in the statute itself, it is another offense that can also be prosecuted under Article 134. It has been DOD policy since at least 2006 to prosecute service members under Article 134 for engaging in prostitution, whether or not the service member is married, and whether or not prostitution is legal under local law. (Prostitution is not illegal under federal law other than the UCMJ.) This is not obvious from the language of Article 134 of the UCMJ (which is codified at 10 U.S. Code § 934), itself, which states: Though not specifically mentioned in this chapter, all disorders and neglects to the prejudice of good order and discipline in the armed forces, all conduct of a nature to bring discredit upon the armed forces, and crimes and offenses not capital, of which persons subject to this chapter may be guilty, shall be taken cognizance of by a general, special, or summary court-martial, according to the nature and degree of the offense, and shall be punished at the discretion of that court. As used in the preceding sentence, the term “crimes and offenses not capital” includes any conduct engaged in outside the United States, as defined in section 5 of title 18, that would constitute a crime or offense not capital if the conduct had been engaged in within the special maritime and territorial jurisdiction of the United States, as defined in section 7 of title 18. But, the primary and authoritative interpretive authority for Article 134 of the UCMJ is the Manual for Courts-Martial, with the force of a law or validly adopted regulation. This indicates that prosecutions for pandering a prostitute under Article 134 does not require a showing that it is illegal to do so under local law.
Financial institutions in the US are subject to regulations that restrict what sorts of things non-licensed employees can talk about with clients and advice they can give about structuring accounts and payments in ways that might avoid triggering money laundering alarms. I think this employee was being cautious about getting into a gray area and phrased the reason they couldn't talk about it poorly. The reason they were restricted from giving you an answer could be a legality, but not necessarily because they are giving you legal advice.
This question is controlled almost entirely by local municipal and county ordinances. It is not a question of federal law that is uniform across the U.S. and in most cases it is not even a question of state law. So, there is no single answer to your question. Most localities regulate this with some combination of hotel specific building codes (usually incorporated by reference from a uniform building code promulgated by a private non-profit organization as a model building code provision) and hotel specific local zoning ordinances.
This was attributed to Dumblaws.com, which is now mercifully nonexistent. It is false, as is the supposed law against fishing for whales on Sunday (seriously? Whales in Ohio?). If someone makes such a claim and gives a specific citation like &quot;ORC 1533.02&quot;, you can look that law up. Otherwise, you can go to the state's repository of laws, which is searchable (not all states are as enlightened). No laws mention &quot;whale&quot; or &quot;housefly&quot;, and only 23 address &quot;fly&quot;, only referring to insects in a couple of cases where e.g. bakery showcases must keep out dust and flies. You might take on this collection, hosted by a law firm. I haven't bothered to check if &quot;It is illegal to drive a camel on the highway&quot; in Nevada – that a least verifiably refers to a law that did exist.
Is it legal to retaliate against an employee who answered falsely when asked an illegal question? It depends. It is important to ensure we understand the distinction between (1) questions which are illegal in and of themselves, and (2) the illegality of hiring, discharging, or failing to hire based on a candidate's/employee's answer(s) or attributes. You yourself might have been aware of the difference beforehand, but your question is a good occasion for clarifying a general misconception. In instances of the first category, it would certainly be illegal to retaliate against the employee insofar as the falsehood is traceable to the employer's violation of the law. Examples of this category are sections 432.3(b) ("An employer shall not [...] seek salary history information, including compensation and benefits, about an applicant for employment") and 432.7 ("An employer [...] shall not ask an applicant for employment to disclose, through any written form or verbally, information concerning an arrest or detention that did not result in conviction") of the California Labor code. Scenarios of the latter category are more intricate, since an employer might prove that his decision to discharge the employee falls outside of conduct sanctioned by statute. For instance, 42 USC § 2000e-2(k)(1)(A)(ii) does not outlaw --at least at a federal level-- questions about the individual's protected categories (such as sex, religion, or national origin). It only outlaws the decision making that is influenced by the protected categories which are the subject matter of the interview questions. The example you gave ("what would your husband do if you got this job?") serves to illustrate the difference, putting aside that questions of that sort might be intended to indirectly ascertain the candidate's marital status. Let's assume that the employer seeks to hire a waitress, and that the jurisdiction at issue outlaws discrimination on the basis of employee's marital status but not the questions about it. The employer has a cognizable interest to avoid employing any waitress whose husband is an overly jealous person with propensity to attack male clients. The waitress's lie when answering that question (for instance, by fraudulently representing that she is single or that her husband is ok with her employment as waitress there) contravenes the employer's legitimate interest to protect its clients. In that context, the employer's discovery that the employee lied during the interview gives reasonable grounds for discharging that employee. After all, the employee's intentional misrepresentation only strengthens the employer's suspicion of being at greater risk (of liability toward clients) than the employee is willing to admit. For the employer to prevail at law, it would need to be proved that the reason for discharging the female employee was not her marital status itself, but the employee's concealment of a risk that is a matter of employer's lawful concern.
It is legal. 18 USC Chapter 17 contains laws regarding what you can/cannot do with US legal tender. It doesn't mention anything about buying, or selling US tender at or above the face value. And there are several businesses in the USA that do this (coin exchanges which purchase coins at less then face value and give you dollar bills in return, etc...). However I would be concerned that your action might look like money laundering to the customs official on your way back home. Or on the way going to the foreign country for that matter. Which could be very bad for you. I would talk to a lawyer about this.
Sexual contact that is not consented to is a crime. Physical contact where the receiver is under the apprehension of imminent risk is the crime of battery. However, spanking in the context of a consensual sexual encounter does not have that apprehension and is therefore not battery. It is akin to the consent given by people who take part in a contact sport. Contracts cannot permit criminal actions. The permission given by the submissive in this agreement would be valid only at that point in time that the contract was made and could be revoked at any time: such revocation could be explicit or implicit. As continuous consent is required for a sexual act and revocation of permission would introduce the apprehension of harm. Whenever the permission was revoked the agreement would be unenforceable. At best, you have a agreement that is enforceable when the permissive wants it to be and not otherwise: more likely, you have a totally unenforceable agreement. More generally, contracts that involve sex acts as consideration are enforceable to the extent that prostitution is legal in the jurisdiction. However, an order for specific performance would not be granted where either of the parties was no longer consenting to the sex act because that would be a court order to commit a crime. Other remedies for breach like damages would be available. For example, if you contracted with a prostitute and refused to pay for services delivered, you could be successfully sued for the fee, any damages, costs and interest.
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.