University of Kentucky UKnowledge Law Faculty Scholarly Articles Law Faculty Publications 2013 Reviving the Federal Crime of Gratuities Sarah N. Welling University of Kentucky College of Law,
[email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://uknowledge.uky.edu/law_facpub Part of the Criminal Law Commons, and the Legislation Commons Right click to open a feedback form in a new tab to let us know how this document benefits ou.y Recommended Citation Sarah Welling, Reviving the Federal Crime of Gratuities, 55 Ariz. L. Rev. 417 (2013). This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Law Faculty Publications at UKnowledge. It has been accepted for inclusion in Law Faculty Scholarly Articles by an authorized administrator of UKnowledge. For more information, please contact
[email protected]. Reviving the Federal Crime of Gratuities Notes/Citation Information Arizona Law Review, Vol. 55, No. 2 (2013), pp. 417-464 This article is available at UKnowledge: https://uknowledge.uky.edu/law_facpub/275 REVIVING THE FEDERAL CRIME OF GRATUITIES Sarah N. Welling* The federal crime of gratuities prohibits people from giving gifts to federal public officials if the gift is tied to an official act. Both the donor and the donee are liable. The gratuities crime is dysfunctional in two main ways. It is overinclusive in that it covers conduct indistinguishable from bribery. It is underinclusive in that it does not cover conduct that is clearly dangerous: gifts to public officials because of their positions that are not tied to a particular official act. This Article argues that Congress should extend the crime of gratuities to cover gifts because of an official’s position rather than leaving the crime to cover only gifts because of particular official acts.