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Page Number: 12

8 

MILLER v. ALABAMA 

Opinion of the Court 

To  start  with  the  first  set  of  cases:  Roper  and  Graham 
establish  that  children  are  constitutionally  different  from 
adults for purposes of sentencing.  Because juveniles have
diminished  culpability  and  greater  prospects  for  reform, 
we  explained,  “they  are  less  deserving  of  the  most  severe 
punishments.”  Graham, 560 U. S., at ___ (slip op., at 17). 
Those cases relied on three significant gaps between juve-
niles and adults.  First, children have a “ ‘lack of maturity
and an underdeveloped sense of responsibility,’ ” leading to
recklessness, impulsivity, and heedless risk-taking.  Roper, 
543  U. S.,  at  569.    Second,  children  “are  more  vulner-
able  . . .  to  negative  influences  and  outside  pressures,”
including  from  their  family  and  peers;  they  have  limited
“contro[l] over their own environment” and lack the ability 
to  extricate  themselves  from  horrific,  crime-producing 
settings.  Ibid.    And  third,  a  child’s  character  is  not  as 
“well formed” as an adult’s; his traits are “less fixed” and 
his  actions  less  likely  to  be  “evidence  of  irretrievabl[e]
deprav[ity].”  Id., at 570. 

Id.,  at  569. 

Our  decisions  rested  not  only  on  common  sense—on 
what  “any  parent  knows”—but  on  science  and  social  sci-
ence  as  well. 
In  Roper,  we  cited  studies 
showing that “‘[o]nly a relatively small proportion of adoles-
cents’ ” who engage in illegal activity “ ‘develop entrenched 
patterns of problem behavior.’ ”  Id., at 570 (quoting Stein-
berg  &  Scott,  Less  Guilty  by  Reason  of  Adolescence:  De-
velopmental  Immaturity,  Diminished  Responsibility,  and 
the  Juvenile  Death  Penalty,  58  Am.  Psychologist  1009, 

—————— 

the  majority’s  reasoning  in  Graham,  which  is  the  foundation  stone  of 
our analysis.  See Graham, 560 U. S., at ___ (ROBERTS, C. J., concurring 
in  judgment)  (slip  op.,  at  1);  id.,  at  ___  (THOMAS,  J.,  joined  by  SCALIA 
and  ALITO,  JJ.,  dissenting)  (slip  op.,  at  1–25);  id.,  at  ___  (ALITO,  J., 
dissenting)  (slip  op.,  at  1).  While  the  dissents  seek  to  relitigate  old 
Eighth Amendment battles, repeating many arguments this Court has
previously  (and  often)  rejected,  we  apply  the  logic  of  Roper,  Graham, 
and our individualized sentencing decisions to these two cases.