Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/21pdf/20-826_p702.pdf
Page Number: 34

Cite as:  596 U. S. ____ (2022) 

5 

KAGAN, J., dissenting 

law.”  Preiser v. Rodriguez, 411 U. S. 475, 485 (1973).  Or 
again:  Citing  Wells  and  Lange  (among  others),  the  Court
described  how  “judicial  decisions  [had]  expand[ed]  the
availability of habeas relief ” to include challenges to final
convictions.  Wainwright v. Sykes, 433 U. S. 72, 79 (1977). 
Or once more: The Court cited a string of 19th- and early
20th-century cases to illustrate how habeas had expanded
to remedy “convictions obtained under an unconstitutional 
statute” or “without adequate procedural protections for the
defendant.”  McCleskey v. Zant, 499 U. S. 467, 478 (1991); 
see also Schlup v. Delo, 513 U. S. 298, 317–318 (1995) (cit-
ing McCleskey and Wainwright and noting the “broadening 
of the scope of the writ” to “encompass review of constitu-
tional error” in criminal proceedings).

The majority tries to cram the many habeas decisions be-
lying  its  position  into  a  narrow  jurisdictional  “exception,” 
ante, at 8—but its effort does no more than reveal the peril
of  looking  at  history  through  a  21st-century  lens.    In  the 
majority’s view, a habeas court could grant relief only “if the
court of conviction lacked jurisdiction,” not if it committed
“errors  in  adjudication.”  Ante,  at  8,  10.    But  some  of  the 
decisions the majority must contend with made no mention 
at all of the convicting (or sentencing) court’s jurisdiction.
See, e.g., Wells, 18 How., at 308–315; Yick Wo, 118 U. S., at 
365–374.  And those that did so often used the word to mean 
something different from what it does today.  The concept
of “jurisdictional defects” (ante, at 9) could at that time in-
clude—rather than contrast with—constitutional errors of 
the kind described above.1  As one legal historian puts the 

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1 See,  e.g.,  Ex  parte  Wilson,  114  U. S.  417,  429  (1885)  (the  lack  of  a 
grand jury indictment meant that the court had “exceeded its jurisdic-
tion”); Callan v. Wilson, 127 U. S. 540, 547, 557 (1888) (a denial of the 
jury trial right rendered a conviction “void” and “without jurisdiction”); 
In re Nielsen, 131 U. S. 176, 185 (1889) (a sentence violating the Double
Jeopardy Clause was “beyond the jurisdiction of the court,” because “an