160
Opinion of the Court
for there are several federal "enactments" that make Lewis' acts punishable, for example, the federal (second-degree) murder statute, § 1111, and the federal assault law, § 113. We agree with the Government, however, that this is not a sensible interpretation of this language, since a literal reading of the words "any enactment" would dramatically separate the statute from its intended purpose.
The ACA's basic purpose is one of borrowing state law to fill gaps in the federal criminal law that applies on federal enclaves. See Williams v. United States, 327 U. S. 711, 718- 719 (1946) (ACA exists "to fill in gaps" in federal law where Congress has not "define[d] the missing offenses"); United States v. Sharpnack, 355 U. S. 286, 289 (1958) (ACA represents congressional decision of "adopting for otherwise undefined offenses the policy of general conformity to local law"); United States v. Press Publishing Co., 219 U. S. 1, 9-10 (1911) (state laws apply to crimes "which were not previously provided for by a law of the United States"); Franklin v. United States, 216 U. S. 559, 568 (1910) (assimilation occurs where state laws "not displaced by specific laws enacted by Congress").
In the 1820's, when the ACA began its life, federal statutory law punished only a few crimes committed on federal enclaves, such as murder and manslaughter. See 1 Stat. 113. The federal courts lacked the power to supplement these few statutory crimes through the use of the common law. See United States v. Hudson, 7 Cranch 32, 34 (1812). Consequently James Buchanan, then a Congressman, could point out to his fellow House Members a "palpable defect in our system," namely, that "a great variety of actions, to which a high degree of moral guilt is attached, and which are punished . . . at the common law, and by every State . . . may be committed with impunity" on federal enclaves. 40 Annals of Cong. 930 (1823). Daniel Webster sought to cure this palpable defect by introducing a bill that both increased the number of federal crimes and also made "the residue"
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