Court Opinion

ID: 9426719
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-02 23:18:46.024035+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:23:02.321490
License: Public Domain

*371Mr. Justice Rehnquist,
dissenting.
Had I joined the plurality opinion in last Term’s Woodson v. North Carolina, 428 U. S. 280 (1976), I would join the concurring opinion of my Brother White in this case. But if capital punishment is not cruel and unusual under the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments, as the Court held in that case, the use of particular sentencing procedures, never previously held unfair under the Due Process Clause, in a case where the death sentence is imposed cannot convert that sentence into a cruel and unusual punishment. The prohibition of the Eighth Amendment relates to the character of the punishment, and not to the process by which it is imposed. I would therefore affirm the judgment of the Supreme Court of Florida.