Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/23pdf/23-175_19m2.pdf
Page Number: 20.0

Cite as:  603 U. S. ____ (2024) 

15 

Opinion of the Court 

II 
A 
The Constitution and its Amendments impose a number 
of limits on what governments in this country may declare
to be criminal behavior and how they may go about enforc-
ing their criminal laws.  Familiarly, the First Amendment 
prohibits  governments  from  using  their  criminal  laws  to
abridge  the  rights  to  speak,  worship,  assemble,  petition,
and exercise the freedom of the press.  The Equal Protection
Clause  of  the  Fourteenth  Amendment  prevents  govern-
ments from adopting laws that invidiously discriminate be-
tween persons.  The Due Process Clauses of the Fifth and 
Fourteenth Amendments ensure that officials may not dis-
place  certain  rules  associated  with  criminal  liability  that
are “so old and venerable,” “ ‘so rooted in the traditions and 
conscience of our people[,] as to be ranked as fundamental.’ ”  
Kahler v. Kansas, 589 U. S. 271, 279 (2020) (quoting Leland 
v. Oregon, 343 U. S. 790, 798 (1952)).  The Fifth and Sixth 
Amendments require prosecutors and courts to observe var-
ious  procedures  before  denying  any  person  of  his  liberty, 
promising for example that every person enjoys the right to
confront his accusers and have serious criminal charges re-
solved by a jury of his peers.  One could go on.

But if many other constitutional provisions address what 
a government may criminalize and how it may go about se-
curing  a  conviction,  the  Eighth  Amendment’s  prohibition 
against “cruel and unusual punishments” focuses on what 
happens  next.  That  Clause  “has always  been  considered, 
and properly so, to be directed at the method or kind of pun-
ishment”  a  government  may  “impos[e]  for  the  violation  of 
criminal statutes.”  Powell v. Texas, 392 U. S. 514, 531–532 
(1968) (plurality opinion).

We  have  previously  discussed  the  Clause’s  origins  and 
meaning.  In the 18th century, English law still “formally 
tolerated” certain barbaric punishments like “disembowel-
ing, quartering, public dissection, and burning alive,” even