Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/21pdf/21-499_gfbh.pdf
Page Number: 3.0

Cite as:  597 U. S. ____ (2022) 

3 

Syllabus 

restrict Miranda’s  application  in  collateral  proceedings  based  on  the 
reasoning  in  Stone  v.  Powell,  428  U. S.  465  (1976).    Once  again  ac-
knowledging that Miranda adopted prophylactic rules, the Court bal-
anced the competing interests and found that the costs of adopting a 
Stone-like rule outweighed any benefits.  In sum, the Court’s post-Mi-
randa cases acknowledge the prophylactic nature of the Miranda rules 
and engage in cost-benefit analysis to define their scope.  Pp. 7–11.

(3) The Court’s decision in Dickerson v. United States, 530 U. S. 428, 
did not upset the firmly established prior understanding of Miranda 
as  a  prophylactic  decision.  Dickerson  involved  a  federal  statute,  18 
U. S. C. §3501, that effectively overruled Miranda by making the ad-
missibility  of  a  statement  given  during  custodial  interrogation  turn 
solely on whether it was made voluntarily.  530 U. S., at 431–432.  The 
Court held that Congress could not abrogate Miranda by statute be-
cause Miranda was a “constitutional decision” that adopted a “consti-
tutional rule,” 530 U. S., at 438–439, and the Court noted that these 
rules could not have been made applicable to the States if they did not
have that status, see ibid.  At the same time, the Court made it clear 
that it was not equating a violation of the Miranda rules with an out-
right  Fifth  Amendment  violation.    Instead,  the  Dickerson  Court  de-
scribed the Miranda rules as “constitutionally based” with “constitu-
tional underpinnings,” 530 U. S., at 440, and n. 5.  Those formulations 
obviously  avoided  saying  that  a  Miranda  violation  is  the  same  as  a 
violation of the Fifth Amendment right.  Miranda was a “constitutional 
decision” and it adopted a “constitutional rule” in the sense that the 
decision was based on the Court’s judgment about what is required to 
safeguard that constitutional right.  And when the Court adopts a con-
stitutional prophylactic rule of this nature, Dickerson concluded, the 
rule has the status of a “La[w] of the United States” that is binding on
the States under the Supremacy Clause (as Miranda implicitly held,
since three of the four decisions it reversed came from state court, 384 
U. S., at 491–494, 497–499), and the rule cannot be altered by ordinary
legislation.  Dickerson thus asserted a bold and controversial claim— 
that  this  Court  has  the  authority  to  create  constitutionally  based 
prophylactic rules that bind both federal and state courts—but Dick-
erson cannot be understood any other way consistent with the Court’s 
prior decisions.  Subsequent cases confirm that Dickerson did not up-
end the Court’s understanding of the Miranda rules as prophylactic.
In sum, a violation of Miranda does not necessarily constitute a viola-
tion of the Constitution, and therefore such a violation does not consti-
tute “the deprivation of [a] right . . . secured by the Constitution” for 
purposes of §1983.  Pp. 11–13. 

(b) A §1983 claim may also be based on “the deprivation of any rights 
. . . secured by the . . . laws.”  But the argument that Miranda rules