They have granted themselves the power to move the goalposts when they see fit.
I thought moral issues were supposed to be decided by elected reps.
Posted on 03/01/2005 7:21:16 AM PST by Next_Time_NJ
The Supreme Court ruled Tuesday that the Constitution forbids the execution of killers who were under 18 when they committed their crimes, ending a practice used in 19 states.
The 5-4 decision throws out the death sentences of about 70 juvenile murderers and bars states from seeking to execute minors for future crimes.
The executions, the court said, were unconstitutionally cruel.
This report will be updated as details become available.
Stupidity writ large. Presidents don't make law. I'll even concede that you probably know that but in an effort to score cheap Hillary and Nazi points, you disregarded it.
As for fences, here are a few moral components for height requirements:
Line of sight obstruction to prevent accidents.
Keeping your animals off others property.
Keeping small children out of your swimming pool.
Need more?
By HOPE YEN, Associated Press Writer
WASHINGTON - The Supreme Court ruled Tuesday that the Constitution forbids the execution of killers who were under 18 when they committed their crimes, ending a practice used in 19 states.
The 5-4 decision throws out the death sentences of about 70 juvenile murderers and bars states from seeking to execute minors for future crimes.
The executions, the court said, violate the Eighth Amendment ban on cruel and unusual punishment.
The ruling continues the court's practice of narrowing the scope of the death penalty, which justices reinstated in 1976. The court in 1988 outlawed executions for those 15 and younger when they committed their crimes. Three years ago justices banned executions of the mentally retarded.
Tuesday's ruling prevents states from making 16- and 17-year-olds eligible for execution.
"The age of 18 is the point where society draws the line for many purposes between childhood and adulthood. It is, we conclude, the age at which the line for death eligibility ought to rest," Justice Anthony Kennedy (news - web sites) wrote.
Juvenile offenders have been put to death in recent years in only a few other countries, including Iran (news - web sites), Pakistan, China and Saudi Arabia. Kennedy cited international opposition to the practice.
"It is proper that we acknowledge the overwhelming weight of international opinion against the juvenile death penalty, resting in large part on the understanding that the instability and emotional imbalance of young people may often be a factor in the crime," he wrote.
Kennedy noted most states don't allow the execution of juvenile killers and those that do use the penalty infrequently. The trend, he said, is to abolish the practice because "our society views juveniles ... as categorically less culpable than the average criminal."
In a dissent, Justice Antonin Scalia (news - web sites) disputed that there is a clear trend of declining juvenile executions to justify a growing consensus against the practice.
"The court says in so many words that what our people's laws say about the issue does not, in the last analysis, matter: 'In the end our own judgment will be brought to bear on the question of the acceptability of the death penalty,'" he wrote.
"The court thus proclaims itself sole arbiter of our nation's moral standards," Scalia wrote.
Death penalty opponents quickly cheered the ruling as a victory for human rights.
"Today, the court repudiated the misguided idea that the United States can pledge to leave no child behind while simultaneously exiling children to the death chamber," said William F. Schulz, executive director of Amnesty International USA.
"Now the U.S. can proudly remove its name from the embarrassing list of human rights violators that includes China, Iran, and Pakistan that still execute juvenile offenders," he said.
The Supreme Court has permitted states to impose capital punishment since 1976 and more than 3,400 inmates await execution in the 38 states that allow death sentences.
Justices were called on to draw an age line in death cases after Missouri's highest court overturned the death sentence given to Christopher Simmons, who was 17 when he kidnapped a neighbor, hog-tied her and threw her off a bridge in 1993. Prosecutors say he planned the burglary and killing of Shirley Crook and bragged that he could get away with it because of his age.
The four most liberal justices had already gone on record in 2002, calling it "shameful" to execute juvenile killers. Those four, joined by Kennedy, formed Tuesday's decision: Justices John Paul Stevens (news - web sites), David H. Souter, Ruth Bader Ginsburg (news - web sites) and Stephen Breyer (news - web sites).
Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist and Justice Clarence Thomas (news - web sites) joined Scalia to uphold the executions.
Justice Sandra Day O'Connor (news - web sites) filed a separate dissent, arguing that a blanket rule against juvenile executions was misguided. Case-by-case determinations of a young offenders' maturity is the better approach, she wrote.
"The court's analysis is premised on differences in the aggregate between juveniles and adults, which frequently do not hold true when comparing individuals," she said. "Chronological age is not an unfailing measure of psychological development, and common experience suggests that many 17-year-olds are more mature than the average young 'adult.'"
The 19 states allow executions for people under age 18 are Alabama, Arizona, Arkansas, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Nevada, New Hampshire, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Utah, Texas and Virginia.
The federal government already bars the execution of juveniles for federal capital crimes.
The case is Roper v. Simmons, 03-633.
___
On the Net:
The decision in Roper v. Simmons in available at:
You've got it!
""The death penalty is not for the purposes of a deterrent. It is for the purpose of removing deadly dangers to the people of a state.
The rationale, pretty ancient I might add, is concurrent and the same as the right to use deadly force to protect yourself from clear and present human dangers to you and your family. ""
Some probably are, I won't argue that.
But they found a basis for their decision in the constitution.
If they erred, it was to mandate what the States can do. They have a bad habit of doing that. But in this case the Constitutional intent is pretty clear.
As to morality..........That is a real joke.
I see many of the same people who are viciously arguing to save Terry Shiavo, yet don't bat a eye when it come to executing a criminal that committed a crime as a juvenile.
It is one on societies little moral relativism jokes, that these days I find to be not very amusing.
Mark"The Great One"Levin was pulling no punches in his recent expose'"Men In Black"!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
EXACTLY!!!!!!!!!!!!!
You can say, "what makes a 16 year old from an 18 year old" and it is equally true. We have to draw a line somewhere. The question is should that line be drawn by the People, or by 9 robed autocrats dictating morality to a society.
Evidently it is not SCOTUS. They refused to hear the case of Terry Schiavo. Starving and dehydrating any person to death would fall under the rubrick of "cruel and unusual", no?
NRO's Corner has an excerpt of Scalia's dissent that discusses parental notification laws in this context...although to make the opposite arguement that you are making...
First life without parole only exist for a very few. Even those that have been on death row have been let out of prison after awile.
But a better question for you, if there is no difference between armed robbery and murder, why do robber leave their victims alive? They are more likely to be caught and convicted if there are witnesses.
I Do!It cost one HELL of a lot of MY MONEY!!!!!!!!!!!!
Yeah, O'Connor finally got one right.
Consider this ... the so called juvenile would be tried as an adult but the death penalty is now off the table. So the prisioner gets life and is part of the general population, not death row. But the court has also made sure that any attempt to protect this "fragile juvenile" by putting him or her into a cell with their own kind is prohibited. Little Johnny or Mary psychopath will find themselves rooming with Bubba or Bubbette Skinhead as the jailors mix and match prisoners in accordance with the recent Johnson ruling.
That rascally Justice Kennedy ... he is really a closet ultra-conservative and has found the solution to the problem!
They have granted themselves the power to move the goalposts when they see fit.
I thought moral issues were supposed to be decided by elected reps.
I'm one. Got a problem with that?
Some of us believe in saving the innocent and killing those who are guilty of capital crimes.
That has been the prevailing view in our civilization for ages, and it is still the right one. Do you disagree?
Have you ever had one of your closest family members taken from you by a murderer?
It has the power, but it clearly exceeded the bounds of their legitimate power when it looked to international law and its own perception of "moral trends" instead of original meaning to define the term "cruel and unusual" in this instance.
We aren't going to resolve this. Have a nice day.
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