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24 

RAMOS v. LOUISIANA 

Opinion of the Court 
Opinion of GORSUCH, J. 

challenge  their  nonunanimous  convictions  through  collat-
eral (i.e., habeas) review.

But again the worries outstrip the facts.  Under Teague 
v. Lane, newly recognized rules of criminal procedure do not 
normally  apply  in  collateral  review.71    True,  Teague  left 
open  the  possibility  of  an  exception  for  “watershed  rules” 
“implicat[ing]  the  fundamental  fairness  [and  accuracy]  of 
the trial.”72  But, as this language suggests, Teague’s test is 
a demanding one, so much so that this Court has yet to an-
nounce a new rule of criminal procedure capable of meeting 
it.73  And  the test is demanding by design, expressly cali-
brated to address the reliance interests States have in the 
finality of their criminal judgments.74 

Nor is the Teague question even before us.  Whether the 
right to jury unanimity applies to cases on collateral review 
is a question for a future case where the parties will have a 
chance to brief the issue and we will benefit from their ad-
versarial presentation.  That litigation is sure to come, and
will rightly take into account the States’ interest in the fi-
nality  of  their  criminal  convictions.  In  this  way,  Teague
frees us to say what we know to be true about the rights of
the  accused  under  our  Constitution  today,  while  leaving
questions about the reliance interest States possess in their
final judgments for later proceedings crafted to account for 
them.  It would hardly make sense to ignore that two-step 
process  and  count  the  State’s  reliance  interests  in  final 
judgments both here and again there.  Certainly the dissent
cites no authority for such double counting. 

Instead, the dissent suggests that the feeble reliance in-
terests it identifies should get a boost because the right to 

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71 489 U. S. 288, 311–312 (1989) (plurality opinion). 
72 Ibid. 
73 See Whorton v. Bockting, 549 U. S. 406, 417–418 (2007). 
74 See Stringer v. Black, 503 U. S. 222, 227–228 (1992).