Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/11pdf/10-9646.pdf
Page Number: 41

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

5 

ROBERTS, C. J., dissenting 

sentences  was  not  dispositive.    Here,  the  Court  excuses 
the  high  number  of  actual  sentences  by  citing  the  high
number  of  statutes  imposing  it.  To  say  that  a  sentence 
may  be  considered  unusual  because  so  many  legislatures
approve it stands precedent on its head.2 

The Court also advances another reason for discounting 
the  laws  enacted  by  Congress  and  most  state  legisla-
tures.  Some of the jurisdictions that impose mandatory life 
without  parole  on  juvenile  murderers  do  so  as  a  result  of 
two  statutes:  one  providing  that  juveniles  charged  with
serious crimes may be tried as adults, and another gener-
ally  mandating  that  those  convicted  of  murder  be  impris-
oned  for  life.  According  to  the  Court,  our  cases  suggest
that where the sentence results from the interaction of two 
such  statutes,  the  legislature  can  be  considered  to  have
imposed  the  resulting  sentences  “inadvertent[ly].”  Ante, 
at  22–25.  The  Court  relies  on  Graham  and  Thompson  v. 
Oklahoma,  487  U. S.  815,  826,  n.  24  (1988)  (plurality 
opinion), for the proposition that these laws are therefore 
not valid evidence of society’s views on the punishment at
issue. 

It  is  a  fair  question  whether  this  Court  should  ever 
assume a legislature is so ignorant of its own laws that it 
does  not  understand  that  two  of  them  interact  with  each 

—————— 

2 The Court’s reference to discretionary sentencing practices is a dis-
traction.  See ante, at 21–22, n. 10.  The premise of the Court’s decision
is that mandatory sentences are categorically different from discretion-
ary  ones.  So  under  the  Court’s  own  logic,  whether  discretionary  sen-
tences  are  common  or  uncommon  has  nothing  to  do  with  whether 
mandatory  sentences  are  unusual.    In  any  event,  if  analysis  of  discre-
tionary sentences were relevant, it would not provide objective support 
for  today’s  decision.    The  Court  states  that  “about  15%  of  all  juvenile
life-without-parole  sentences”—meaning  nearly  400  sentences—were
imposed  at  the  discretion  of  a  judge  or  jury.    Ante,  at  22,  n. 10.    Thus 
the  number  of  discretionary  life  without  parole  sentences  for  juvenile 
murderers,  relative  to  the  number  of  juveniles  arrested  for  murder,  is 
about 1,000 times higher than the corresponding number in Graham.