Opinion ID: 1060419
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 22

Heading: Evidence of Contemporary Values in Tennessee

Text: Although a defendant always has the burden of proving that a societal consensus concerning the punishment at issue has emerged, see Stanford v. Kentucky, 492 U.S. 361, 373, 109 S.Ct. 2969, 106 L.Ed.2d 306 (1989), the petitioner in this case has failed to satisfactorily demonstrate that Tennesseans have arrived at a consensus against executing persons whose mental condition does not affect their cognitive, moral, or volitional capacities to commit murder. The petitioner has brought forward no evidence that juries regularly fail to return a capital sentence against persons whose mental condition does not affect their cognitive, moral, or volitional capacities to commit murder. He has not shown that prosecutors routinely fail to seek the death penalty in eligible cases when the defendant has a mental condition that does not affect his or her cognitive, moral, or volitional capacities to commit murder. Furthermore, the petitioner has cited no opinion polls in this state that demonstrate that the people of this State overwhelmingly believe that it is morally wrong to execute persons whose mental condition does not affect their cognitive, moral, or volitional capacities to commit murder. In fact, the only objective indicium presented by the petitioner that Tennesseans have reached a definitive consensus on this issue is the presence of Tennessee Code Annotated section 39-13-203. As the majority correctly notes, the presence of a statute permitting or prohibiting a particular form of punishment is a strong indicator of the public views regarding its use. However, just as the presence of a statute permitting a punishment cannot be viewed in isolation as constitutionally sanctioning the practice, Black, 815 S.W.2d at 188, neither can the isolated presence of a statute prohibiting a punishment also mean that the Constitution now forbids its use. Importantly, the United States Supreme Court has rejected the view that a single statute, without other evidence of contemporary values, demonstrates a consensus among those represented sufficient to command constitutional change. One year before Penry was decided, the Congress of the United States enacted a provision that specifically provided that [a] sentence of death shall not be carried out upon a person who is mentally retarded. See 21 U.S.C. § 848( l ) (1988). Although Congress presumably acts with the full voice and authority of the nation as a wholeand therefore presumably reflects the contemporary values and norms of the nationthe Penry Court did not find that this statute evidenced a national consensus against executing mentally retarded persons. See Penry, 492 U.S. at 304. Instead, the Court gave the mere presence of this national statute virtually no weight at all, and it continued to look elsewhere for evidence of a national consensus on the issue. In this case, however, the majority takes an approach that is curiously contrary to the well-reasoned analysis taken in Penry . Armed only with the presence of a single statute on the issue, the majority declares that Tennesseans have reached a consensus sufficient to justify constitutional change. I simply cannot agree. When a punishment furthers legitimate goals of punishment, and when that punishment is proportional to the offense and to the offender, the mere presence of a statute restricting the use of that punishment cannot be sufficient evidence of the punishment's substantive constitutionality. Indeed, because the majority has no evidence of the public judgment in Tennessee other than the presence of this statute, the practical effect of its holding in this case is to elevate that statutory text to constitutional commandment. In so doing, the majority has essentially bestowed upon the General Assembly the power to constitutionally prohibit punishment under Article I, section 16 through the mere enactment of a single statute. This reasoning is flawed, however, because it ignores the constitutional reality that the people have not given the General Assembly the ultimate power to alter or amend their Charter of government. Instead, the people have expressly reserved that power for themselves. See Tenn. Const. art. I, § 1; art. XI, § 3. Through the exercise of its legislative power, the General Assembly is always free to prohibit any type of punishment that it deems inappropriate. Indeed, because the legislative power of the state includes the power to define punishment for crime, see Bibbs v. State, 162 Tenn. 646, 649, 39 S.W.2d 1024, 1025 (1931); see also Harris, 844 S.W.2d at 602, the Constitution itself confers upon the General Assembly broad discretion to permit and proscribe different types of punishment. In exercising the legislative power to enjoin a particular punishment, however, it has never been understood that the General Assembly has also effectively declared that punishment to be unconstitutional and, therefore, outside its power to re-enact or amend at a later date should it so desire. To the extent that the majority's holding today, which relies solely upon the presence of a single statute to evidence the public's constitutional judgment, now permits this conclusion to follow, I believe that it represents an unconstitutional interference with the legislative power to fix and define punishment, see Tenn. Const. art. II, § 2, and I cannot join in its decision.