Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/23pdf/23-175_19m2.pdf
Page Number: 60

16 

CITY OF GRANTS PASS v. JOHNSON 

SOTOMAYOR, J., dissenting 

be homeless.  Instead, in a city with no public shelters, they 
have no alternative but to sleep in parks or on the street”). 
Every human needs to sleep at some point.  Even if home-
less people with no available shelter options can exist for a 
few days in Grants Pass without sleeping, they eventually
must leave or be criminally punished.

The majority resists this understanding, arguing that the
Ordinances  criminalize  the  conduct  of  being  homeless  in 
Grants  Pass  while  sleeping  with  as  little  as  a  blanket. 
Therefore,  the  argument  goes,  “[r]ather  than  criminalize
mere  status,  Grants  Pass  forbids  actions.”  Ante,  at  20. 
With no discussion about what it means to criminalize “sta-
tus” or “conduct,” the majority’s analysis consists of a few 
sentences repeating its conclusion again and again in hopes 
that  it  will become  true.    See  ante,  at  20–21  (proclaiming 
that the Ordinances “forbi[d] actions” “[r]ather than crimi-
nalize mere status”; and that they “do not criminalize mere
status”).  The best the majority can muster is the following 
tautology:  The  Ordinances  criminalize  conduct,  not  pure
status, because they apply to conduct, not status.

The flaw in this conclusion is evident.  The majority coun-
tenances  the  criminalization  of  status  as  long  as  the  City 
tacks  on  an  essential  bodily  function—blinking,  sleeping, 
eating, or breathing.  That is just another way to ban the 
person.  By this logic, the majority would conclude that the 
ordinance deemed unconstitutional in Robinson criminaliz-
ing “being an addict” would be constitutional if it criminal-
ized “being an addict and breathing.”  Or take the example 
in Robinson: “Even one day in prison would be a cruel and 
unusual  punishment  for  the  ‘crime’  of  having  a  common 
cold.”  370 U. S., at 667.  According to the majority, although
it is cruel and unusual to punish someone for having a com-
mon  cold,  it  is  not  cruel  and  unusual  to  punish  them  for 
sniffling or coughing because of that cold.  See Manning v. 
Caldwell, 930 F. 3d 264, 290 (CA4 2019) (Wilkinson, J., dis-
senting)  (“In  the  rare  case  where  the  Eighth  Amendment