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ORDERS 

1069 

1067 

Statement of Stevens, J. 

questions  below  poses  a  nearly  insurmountable  hurdle  for  those 
seeking  to  raise  similar  Eighth  Amendment  challenges. 

In  my  view,  these  procedural  questions  are  inextricably  linked 
to  the  two  underlying  evils  of  intolerable  delay.  First,  the  delay 
itself  subjects  death  row  inmates  to  decades  of  especially  severe, 
dehumanizing  conditions  of  conﬁnement.  See  Thompson,  556 
U. S.,  at  1115  (Stevens,  J.,  statement  respecting  denial  of  certio­
rari);  Lackey,  514  U. S.,  at  1046–1047  (same);  see  also  Furman  v. 
Georgia, 408 U. S. 238, 288 (1972) (Brennan, J., concurring) (“[T]he 
prospect  of  pending  execution  exacts  a  frightful  toll  during  the 
inevitable  long  wait  between  the  imposition  of  sentence  and  the 
actual  inﬂiction  of  death”).  Second,  “delaying  an  execution  does 
not further public purposes of retribution and deterrence but only 
diminishes  whatever  possible  beneﬁt  society  might  receive  from 
petitioner’s  death.”  Thompson,  556  U. S.,  at  1115  (Stevens,  J., 
statement  respecting  denial  of  certiorari).  In  other  words,  the 
penological  justiﬁcations  for  the  death  penalty  diminish  as  the 
delay  lengthens.  Ibid.;  Lackey,  514  U. S.,  at  1046–1047.  Thus, 
I  ﬁnd  constitutionally  signiﬁcant  both  the  conditions  of  conﬁne­
ment  and  the  nature  of  the  penalty  itself. 

In  light  of  these  coextensive  concerns,  I  ﬁnd  it  quite  difﬁcult 
to  conclude,  as  the  courts  below  did,  that  Johnson’s  § 1983  action 
is the functional equivalent of a habeas petition.  Both the grava­
men  of  petitioner’s  complaint  and  one  of  the  central  concerns 
animating  Lackey  is  that  the  “method”  of  the  State’s  execution  of 
a  death  sentence—a  lengthy  delay  due  in  no  small  part  to  the 
State’s  malfeasance  in  this  case—is  itself  unconstitutional.  We 
have  held  that  “method”  of  execution  claims  are  cognizable  under 
§ 1983.  Hill  v.  McDonough,  547  U. S.  573,  580  (2006);  see  also 
Nelson  v.  Campbell, 541 U. S. 637, 645–647 (2004).  But a success­
ful  Lackey  claim  would  have  the  effect  of  rendering  invalid  a 
particular death sentence, suggesting that Johnson’s Lackey claim 
“directly call[s] into question the ‘fact’ or ‘validity’ of the sentence 
itself,”  Nelson,  541  U. S.,  at  644.  Were  petitioner  to  prevail,  it  is 
true  that  the  State  will  not  be  able  to  go  forward  in  this  case 
“by  simply  altering  its  method  of  execution,”  ibid.  On  the  other 
hand,  it  is  equally  true  that,  had  the  State  not  carried  out  his 
sentence  in  this  intolerably  cruel  manner,  the  State  would  have 
been  quite  free,  as  a  constitutional  matter,  to  “go  forward  with 
the  sentence,”  ibid.