{"id":1566,"date":"2023-12-14T15:15:25","date_gmt":"2023-12-14T20:15:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.law.georgetown.edu\/public-policy-journal\/?page_id=1566"},"modified":"2025-05-12T11:11:35","modified_gmt":"2025-05-12T15:11:35","slug":"ruan-v-united-states-an-important-ruling-or-merely-sound-and-fury","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/www.law.georgetown.edu\/public-policy-journal\/in-print-2\/volume-21-issue-2-summer-2023\/ruan-v-united-states-an-important-ruling-or-merely-sound-and-fury\/","title":{"rendered":"Ruan v. United States: An Important Ruling or Merely Sound and Fury?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"p2\">Some opinions by the Supreme Court of the United States resemble the finale to Tchaikovsky\u2019s <span class=\"s2\"><i>1812 Overture<\/i><\/span>. They announce their importance not with a band but with an entire orchestra\u2014and cannons. The Court\u2019s recent decision in <span class=\"s2\"><i>Dobbs v. Jackson Women\u2019s Health Organization <\/i><\/span>is one of those cases.<span class=\"s3\">\u00a0<\/span><span class=\"s2\"><i>Dobbs <\/i><\/span>overturned the Court\u2019s 1973 ruling in <span class=\"s2\"><i>Roe v. Wade <\/i><\/span>that the Fourteenth Amendment\u2019s Due Process Clause guarantees a woman the right to have an abortion.<span class=\"s3\">\u00a0<\/span>The reverberations from <span class=\"s2\"><i>Dobbs <\/i><\/span>will be felt for a long time.<\/p>\n<p class=\"p2\">By contrast, another recent Supreme Court decision\u2014<span class=\"s2\"><i>Ruan v. United States<\/i><\/span>\u2014 will create excitement only among a particular subset of the academy and bar, those who teach or practice criminal law.<span class=\"s3\">\u00a0<\/span><span class=\"s2\"><i>Ruan <\/i><\/span>involved an interpretation of the principal federal law governing the distribution of legal and illegal drugs, the Controlled Substances Act of 1970. The Court held that a licensed physician cannot be convicted of violating the CSA for the unlawful distribution of opioids unless the government proves beyond a reasonable doubt that he or she know-ingly prescribed that medication for an illegitimate purpose\u2014viz., one that is beyond accepted medical practice. That ruling reaffirms the importance of the role of <span class=\"s1\"><i>mens rea <\/i><\/span>in distinguishing \u201cgood guys who made a mistake\u201d from \u201cbad guys who flouted the law.\u201d It does so by requiring the government to prove that a defendant knowingly engaged in wrongdoing. Any such ruling could greatly help defendants.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Continue reading <a href=\"https:\/\/www.law.georgetown.edu\/public-policy-journal\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/23\/2023\/12\/Ruan-v.-United-States_Larkin.pdf\"><em>Ruan v. United States<\/em>: An Important Ruling or Merely Sound and Fury?<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Some opinions by the Supreme Court of the United States resemble the finale to Tchaikovsky\u2019s 1812 Overture. They announce their importance not with a band but with an entire orchestra\u2014and [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":29,"featured_media":0,"parent":1543,"menu_order":10,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"abstract.php","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_price":"","_stock":"","_tribe_ticket_header":"","_tribe_default_ticket_provider":"","_tribe_ticket_capacity":"0","_ticket_start_date":"","_ticket_end_date":"","_tribe_ticket_show_description":"","_tribe_ticket_show_not_going":false,"_tribe_ticket_use_global_stock":"","_tribe_ticket_global_stock_level":"","_global_stock_mode":"","_global_stock_cap":"","_tribe_rsvp_for_event":"","_tribe_ticket_going_count":"","_tribe_ticket_not_going_count":"","_tribe_tickets_list":"[]","_tribe_ticket_has_attendee_info_fields":false,"footnotes":"","_tec_slr_enabled":"","_tec_slr_layout":""},"class_list":["post-1566","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"acf":[],"ticketed":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.law.georgetown.edu\/public-policy-journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1566","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.law.georgetown.edu\/public-policy-journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.law.georgetown.edu\/public-policy-journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.law.georgetown.edu\/public-policy-journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/29"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.law.georgetown.edu\/public-policy-journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1566"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.law.georgetown.edu\/public-policy-journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1566\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1863,"href":"https:\/\/www.law.georgetown.edu\/public-policy-journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1566\/revisions\/1863"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.law.georgetown.edu\/public-policy-journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1543"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.law.georgetown.edu\/public-policy-journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1566"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}