Every Gift a Crime? Taking Ethics Reform Too Far

• By Robert L. Walker
• Special to Roll Call
• May 4, 2009, Midnight

Ten years ago this April, a unanimous Supreme Court held in the United States v. Sun-Diamond Growers of California that to establish a federal gratuities violation — a felony punishable by two years imprisonment — prosecutors had to prove “a link between a thing of value conferred upon a public official and a specific ‘official act’ for or because of which it was given.”