"Assessing the Impact of Johnson v. United States on the Void-for-Vagueness Doctrine"

The title of this post is the title of this effective and extensive new Casetext essay authored by Carissa Hessick. It starts and ends this way:

Johnson v. United States, 135 S. Ct. 2551 (2015)

, held that the so-called “residual clause” of the Armed Career Criminal Act (“ACCA”) was unconstitutionally vague.  Johnson generated a large amount of litigation in the federal courts.  Less than a year after it was decided, the Supreme Court decided another Johnson case, Welch v. United States, 136 S. Ct. 1257 (2016), which held that the rule in Johnson should be applied retroactively to those defendants whose convictions and sentences have already become final.  The Supreme Court has also agreed to hear two new Johnson cases in the 2016 Term.

Johnson raised important constitutional doubts about federal statutes that employ the so-called “categorical approach” to classifying criminal conduct, as well as doubts about certain Federal Sentencing Guidelines.  This short essay describes Johnson and explores the Johnson-related issues that the Court will hear this Term....

Johnson v. United States is of the most cited U.S. Supreme Court cases from recent Terms.  Johnson obviously affected the large number of defendants who were sentenced under the residual clause of the Armed Career Criminal Act.  It may, however, have a lasting impact on the vagueness doctrine itself.  By questioning the viability of the categorical approach and by clarifying that the doctrine applies also to laws that fix sentences, Johnson has called into doubt the constitutionality of other federal criminal laws and various Federal Sentencing Guidelines.  We will have to await the decisions in Lynch v. Dimaya and Beckles v. United States in order to fully assess the legacy of Johnson.  If the government loses those cases, then we are likely to see a further challenges to laws that fall within the long shadow of Johnson.