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529US2

Unit: $U52

[09-26-01 10:36:40] PAGES PGT: OPIN

Cite as: 529 U. S. 513 (2000)

545

Opinion of the Court

nesses.32 As explained earlier, see supra, at 517–518, 531–
533, Article 38.07 is a sufﬁciency of the evidence rule. As
such, it does not merely “regulat[e] . . . the mode in which
the facts constituting guilt may be placed before the jury,”
(Rule 601(a) already does that), but governs the sufﬁciency
Indeed, Hopt
of those facts for meeting the burden of proof.
expressly distinguished witness competency laws from those
laws that “alter the degree, or lessen the amount or measure,
of the proof which was made necessary to conviction when
the crime was committed.”
110 U. S., at 589; see also id.,
at 590 (felon witness law “leav[es] untouched . . . the amount
or degree of proof essential to conviction”).

It is proﬁtable, in this respect, to compare the statutes in
Hopt and Thompson with the text of Article 38.07. The law
in Hopt proscribed a “ ‘rul[e] for determining the competency
of witnesses’ ” that stated “ ‘persons .
. convict[ed of a]
felony . . . shall not be witnesses.’ ” 110 U. S., at 587–588.
The statute in Thompson, similarly, speciﬁed that “ ‘com-
parison of a disputed writing . . . shall be permitted to be
made by witnesses, and such writings . . . may be submitted
to the court and jury as evidence.’ ” 171 U. S., at 381. Arti-
cle 38.07, however, speaks in terms of whether “[a] convic-

.

32 That subsection contains an exception for “[c]hildren or other per-
sons who, after being examined by the court, appear not to possess suf-
ﬁcient intellect to relate transactions with respect to which they are
interrogated.”

It is also worth observing that before 1986, Rule 601(a) was codiﬁed as
Tex. Code Crim. Proc. Ann., Art. 38.06 (Vernon 1979)—the section im-
(The provision then
mediately preceding the law at issue in this case.
read: “All persons are competent to testify in criminal cases,” and con-
tained a similar exception for child witnesses.) We think it fair to infer
that Texas was well aware of the differences in the language used in these
adjacent provisions, and understood that the laws served two different
functions. The dissent views Article 38.07 as an exception to the general
rule of former Article 38.06.
It ﬁnds it logical that the exception would
be placed next to the general rule, post, at 564, n. 8, but does not suggest
a reason why it would be logical for the supposed exception to be phrased
in language so utterly different from the general rule.