Court Opinion

ID: 9462263
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-04 22:36:39.149375+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:37:30.459924
License: Public Domain

GODBOLD, Circuit Judge, with whom BROWN, Chief Judge,
joins (dissenting):
I agree with Judge Rives that arbitrary and excessive corporal punishment is a denial of substantive due process, although I am not convinced that the punishment in this case rose to the level of such a violation. I, therefore, disagree with the majority’s statement that it would be an abuse of our judicial power to determine whether punishment inflicted in a particular case exceeds constitutional limits. This is a mere rule of convenience, made palatable by characterizing the issue as the difference between five and ten licks. I doubt that the majority really means what it says, and I suspect that if in a future case the punishment inflicted has broken the vic*921tim’s leg we will face the issue and hold that substantive due process has been violated.