Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/boundvolumes/529bv.pdf
Page Number: 642

529US2

Unit: $U52

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

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

567

Ginsburg, J., dissenting

no reason to anticipate that K. M. would not report the as-
sault within the outcry period, nor any cause to expect that
corroborating evidence would not turn up sooner or later.
Nor is the Clause’s second purpose relevant here, for there
is no indication that the Texas Legislature intended to single
out this defendant or any class of defendants for vindictive
or arbitrary treatment.
Instead, the amendment of Article
38.07 simply brought the rules governing certain victim
testimony in sexual offense prosecutions into conformity
with Texas law governing witness testimony generally.

In holding the new Article 38.07 unconstitutional as ap-
plied to Carmell, the Court relies heavily on the fourth cate-
gory of ex post facto statutes enumerated by Justice Chase
in his opinion in Calder v. Bull, 3 Dall. 386, 390 (1798):
“Every law that alters the legal rules of evidence, and re-
ceives less, or different, testimony, than the law required at
the time of the commission of the offence, in order to convict
the offender.”
Justice Chase’s formulation was dictum, of
course, because Calder involved a civil statute and the Court
held that the statute was not ex post facto for that reason
alone. Moreover, Justices Paterson and Iredell in their own
seriatim opinions gave no hint that they considered rules of
evidence to fall within the scope of the Clause. See id., at
395–397 (Paterson, J.); id., at 398–400 (Iredell, J.). Still, this
Court has come to view Justice Chase’s categorical enumera-
tion as an authoritative gloss on the Ex Post Facto Clause’s
reach.
Just a decade ago in Collins v. Youngblood, 497 U. S.
37 (1990), for instance, this Court reiterated that “the pro-
hibition which may not be evaded is the one deﬁned by the
Calder categories.”

Id., at 46.

If those words are placed in the context of the full text of
the Collins opinion, however, a strong case can be made that
Collins pared the number of Calder categories down to
three, eliminating altogether the fourth category on which
the Court today so heavily relies. As long ago as 1925, in
Beazell v. Ohio, 269 U. S. 167, the Court cataloged ex post