Opinion ID: 716733
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: California Department of Corrections v. Morales: Effects

Text: 100 Most recently, California Department of Corrections v. Morales, --- U.S. ----, 115 S.Ct. 1597, 131 L.Ed.2d 588 (1995), contributed two additional elements to the punishment analysis: it further shifts the focus from a law's purpose to its effect, and it establishes that the appropriate punishment analysis is flexible and context-dependent. In Morales, the Court rejected an ex post facto challenge to a California statute that decreased a prisoner's entitlement to parole eligibility hearings. Under the law in effect at the time of the defendant's crime, he was entitled to parole suitability hearings every year after his initial parole determination. Id. at ----, 115 S.Ct. at 1600. The California legislature subsequently amended the law to allow the review board to defer subsequent suitability hearings if (1) the prisoner has been convicted of more than one offense which involves the taking of a life, and (2) the board finds that it is not reasonable to expect that parole would be granted. Id. (citing Cal.Penal Code Ann. § 3041.5(b)(2) (West 1982)). After finding the defendant unsuitable for parole, the review board invoked this new provision to delay his next suitability hearing for three years. Id. 101 As with the other cases discussed so far, the Court framed the question as whether the measure increased the 'punishment' attached to respondent's crime. Id. at ----, 115 S.Ct. at 1601. Rejecting the defendant's claim that this change constituted punishment, the Court distinguished cases holding that legislative changes effectively increasing jail terms violated the Ex Post Facto Clause. Id. Unlike the measures in those cases, the Court said, the statute at issue creates only the most speculative and attenuated risk of increasing the measure of punishment attached to the covered crimes. Id. at ----, 115 S.Ct. at 1605. The likelihood of parole for those covered----double murderers----is quite remote. Id. at ----, 115 S.Ct. at 1603. Moreover, the carefully tailored authority of the board directs it to delay hearings only when it concludes that the hearings would be of no avail to the prisoner. Id. at ----, 115 S.Ct. at 1604. 102 Morales makes clear that a law can constitute unconstitutional punishment because of its effects. The Court leads off its discussion with the declaration that [t]he legislation at issue here effects no change in the definition of respondent's crime. Id. at ----, 115 S.Ct. at 1601. The opinion then spends the bulk of its analysis examining the effect of the legislative change on Morales. See id. at ---- - ----, 115 S.Ct. at 1601-04. In doing so, it concedes that a measure effectively extending a sentence of imprisonment constitutes punishment, presumably regardless of the legislature's motivation. See id. at ----, 115 S.Ct. at 1601 (citing and distinguishing Lindsey v. Washington, 301 U.S. 397, 57 S.Ct. 797, 81 L.Ed. 1182 (1937); Miller v. Florida, 482 U.S. 423, 107 S.Ct. 2446, 96 L.Ed.2d 351 (1987); Weaver v. Graham, 450 U.S. 24, 101 S.Ct. 960, 67 L.Ed.2d 17 (1981)). Morales concludes that the impact on the prisoner was not great enough to warrant finding an ex post facto violation. We have long held, the Court said, that the question of what legislative adjustments will be held to be of sufficient moment to transgress the constitutional prohibition must be a matter of degree. Id. at ----, 115 S.Ct. at 1603 (internal quotations omitted) (emphasis added). 25 103 Morales also highlights the flexibility of the punishment inquiry. It makes no reference or citation to De Veau, Halper, Austin, or Kurth Ranch at all. This could be read as a rejection of those standards in the ex post facto context, but we think that the better reading of this mere omission in Morales is that the appropriate punishment analysis depends on the context. The Court said as much: [W]e have previously declined to articulate a single 'formula' for identifying those legislative changes that have a sufficient effect on substantive crimes or punishments to fall within the constitutional prohibition, and we have no occasion to do so here. Id. (citation omitted). Morales did not need to discuss Austin and its progeny because the facts in Morales involved imprisonment; the Court needed only to discuss and distinguish the most on-point cases of Lindsey, Weaver, and Miller, supra. And in doing so it looked at negative effects on Morales as a matter of degree. Id. 104 This examination of effects, like the Austin inquiry into history, is necessary to limit what would otherwise be the untenable results of the De Veau subjective purpose inquiry and the Halper means-end calculus. While even a substantial sting will not render a measure punishment, see Halper, 490 U.S. at 447 n. 7, 109 S.Ct. at 1901 n. 7; Kurth Ranch, --- U.S. at ---- n. 14, 114 S.Ct. at 1945 n. 14, at some level the sting will be so sharp that it can only be considered punishment regardless of the legislators' subjective thoughts. For example, the legislature, with the purest heart(s), could extend the prison sentences of all previously convicted sex offenders for the sole reason of protecting potential future victims. It was simply not understood how dangerous they would be when released, the legislators could truthfully explain, and society would be safe only if sex offenders were kept behind bars. This remedial purpose would thus fully explain the continued incarceration; in the other terms of Halper, the continued imprisonment would be rationally related to the goal of protecting vulnerable citizens. But no Justice has ever voted to uphold a statute that retroactively increased the term of imprisonment for a past offense. See Miller v. Florida, 482 U.S. 423, 107 S.Ct. 2446, 96 L.Ed.2d 351 (1987); Weaver v. Graham, 450 U.S. 24, 101 S.Ct. 960, 67 L.Ed.2d 17 (1981). 105