[VRWCmember]

When it came time to charge Ms. Bond with a crime, federal prosecutors chose a novel theory. They indicted her not only for stealing mail, an obvious federal offense, but also for using unconventional weapons in violation of the Chemical Weapons Convention of 1993, a treaty aimed at terrorists and rogue states.

Had she been prosecuted in state court, Ms. Bond would most likely have faced a sentence of three months to two years, her lawyers say. In federal court, she got six years.

Ms. Bond’s argument on appeal was that Congress did not have the constitutional power to use a chemical weapons treaty to address a matter of a sort routinely handled by state authorities.

She might have a problem with her argument. Article VI of the Constitution says this:

...
This Constitution, and the Laws of the United States which shall be made in Pursuance thereof; and all Treaties made, or which shall be made, under the Authority of the United States, shall be the supreme Law of the Land; and the Judges in every State shall be bound thereby, any Thing in the Constitution or Laws of any State to the Contrary notwithstanding.
...

So if her method of distributing a chemical weapon is a violation of the treaty then it is also a violation of federal law. If a jihadi terrorist from some other country, visiting this country legally or illegally, had committed this same act of attempted murder or terrorism against a citizen or citizens of this country, we would certainly want to throw every possible charge against him, including the provisions of this treaty which have been established as part of the supreme law of the land.

[Constitutionalist Conservative]

So if her method of distributing a chemical weapon is a violation of the treaty then it is also a violation of federal law. If a jihadi terrorist from some other country, visiting this country legally or illegally, had committed this same act of attempted murder or terrorism against a citizen or citizens of this country, we would certainly want to throw every possible charge against him, including the provisions of this treaty which have been established as part of the supreme law of the land.

I see a lot of problems in your reasoning. For example, are you saying that everything under your kitchen sink falls under the purview of the Chemical Weapons Convention if they're used in an attempted murder?

The intent of the perpetrator matters a lot in the law. There's a huge legal difference between an act of terror and the violence that occurs in the context of a love triangle.

The Supremacy clause doesn't make the Constitution, federal laws and treaties equal with one another, but rather declares these things to be superior to any act of individual states. Federal laws and treaty enforcement are both subject to constitutional limits (otherwise, the Constitutional limits on power are meaningless).

Bond's argument is that, according to the Constitution's limits on federal power, this application of the Chemical Weapons Convention is illegal. That seems sound to me.