Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/11pdf/10-9646.pdf
Page Number: 23.0

Cite as:  567 U. S. ____ (2012) 

19 

Opinion of the Court 

ing  to  the  sentencing  of  juvenile  offenders.    We  have  by
now  held  on  multiple  occasions  that  a  sentencing  rule
permissible for adults may not be so for children.  Capital
punishment,  our  decisions  hold,  generally  comports  with
the  Eighth  Amendment—except  it  cannot  be  imposed  on
children.  See  Roper,  543  U. S.  551;  Thompson,  487  U. S. 
815.  So too, life without parole is permissible for nonhom-
icide  offenses—except,  once  again,  for  children.    See  Gra-
ham,  560  U. S.,  at  ___  (slip  op.,  at  24).  Nor  are  these 
sentencing decisions an oddity in the law.  To the contrary,
“ ‘[o]ur  history  is  replete  with  laws  and  judicial  recogni-
tion’  that  children  cannot  be  viewed  simply  as  miniature
adults.”  J.  D.  B.,  564  U. S.,  at  ___  (slip  op.,  at  10–11) 
(quoting  Eddings,  455  U. S.,  at  115–116,  citing  examples 
from criminal, property, contract,  and tort law).  So if (as 
Harmelin  recognized)  “death  is  different,”  children  are 
different too.  Indeed, it is the odd legal rule that does not 
have some form of exception for children.  In that context, 
it is no surprise that the law relating to society’s harshest 
punishments  recognizes  such  a  distinction.    Cf.  Graham, 
560 U. S., at ___ (ROBERTS, C. J., concurring in judgment) 
(slip op., at 7) (“Graham’s age places him in a significantly
different category from the defendan[t] in . . . Harmelin”).
Our ruling thus neither overrules nor undermines nor con- 
flicts with Harmelin. 

Alabama  and  Arkansas  (along  with  THE  CHIEF  JUS-
TICE and JUSTICE ALITO) next contend that because many 
States impose mandatory life-without-parole sentences on
juveniles,  we  may  not  hold  the  practice  unconstitutional. 
In  considering  categorical  bars  to  the  death  penalty  and
life without parole, we ask as part of the analysis whether 
“ ‘objective  indicia  of  society’s  standards,  as  expressed  in 
legislative  enactments  and  state  practice,’ ”  show  a  “na-
tional consensus” against a sentence for a particular class
of  offenders.  Graham,  560  U. S.,  at  ___  (slip  op.,  at  10) 
(quoting Roper, 543 U. S., at 563).  By our count, 29 juris-