Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/14pdf/14-7955_aplc.pdf
Page Number: 79

Cite as:  576 U. S. ____ (2015) 

29 

BREYER, J., dissenting 

concerns  about  delays  in  capital  cases,  the  Ad Hoc  Com­
mittee on Federal Habeas Corpus in Capital Cases (Com­
mittee).  The  Committee  presented  a  report  to  Congress,
and Justice Powell testified that “[d]elay robs the penalty
of  much  of  its  deterrent  value.”    Habeas  Corpus  Reform,
Hearings  before  the  Senate  Committee  on  the  Judiciary, 
100th Cong., 1st and 2d Sess., 35 (1989 and 1990).  Justice 
Powell,  according  to  his  official  biographer,  ultimately
concluded that capital punishment: 

“ ‘serves  no  useful  purpose.’    The  United  States  was 
‘unique among the industrialized nations of the West
in maintaining the death penalty,’ and it was enforced 
so rarely that it could not deter.  More important, the 
haggling and delay and seemingly endless litigation in 
every  capital  case  brought  the  law  itself  into  disre­
pute.”  Jeffries, supra, at 452. 

In short, the problem of excessive delays led Justice Pow­
ell, at least in part, to conclude that the death penalty was
unconstitutional. 

As  I  have  said,  today  delays  are  much  worse.  When 
Chief  Justice  Rehnquist  appointed  Justice  Powell  to  the 
Committee,  the  average  delay  between  sentencing  and 
execution  was  7  years  and  11  months,  compared  with  17
years  and  7  months  today.    Compare  BJS,  L.  Greenfeld,
Capital  Punishment,  1990,  p.  11  (Table  12)  (Sept.  1991)
with supra, at 18–19. 

C 
One might ask, why can Congress or the States not deal
directly  with  the  delay  problem?    Why  can  they  not  take
steps to shorten the time between sentence and execution, 
and  thereby  mitigate  the  problems  just  raised?    The  an­
swer is that shortening delay is  much more difficult than 
one might think.  And that is in part because efforts to do
so risk causing procedural harms that also undermine the