Stanford CIS

Justice Stevens Takes on Originalism

By Stanford Center for Internet and Society on

In Roper v. Simmons, today's 5-4 decision outlawing the juvenile death penalty, Justice Stevens begins his concurrence with a direct hit at Justice Scalia (soon to be Chief, by the way):

JUSTICE STEVENS, with whom JUSTICE GINSBURG joins, concurring.  Perhaps even more important than our specific holding  today is our reaffirmation of the basic principle that informs the Court’s interpretation of the Eighth Amendment.  If the meaning of that Amendment had been frozen  when it was originally drafted, it would impose no impediment to the execution of 7-year-old children today.  See Stanford v. Kentucky,  492 U. S. 361, 368 (1989) (describing the common law at the time of the Amendment’s  adoption).

Thank heavens we're not stuck in 1789 with Justice Scalia.

I can just see the Rove machine in action in 2006:  "Stop activist judges; bring back the juvenile death penalty!"

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