Court Opinion

ID: 9429420
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-02 23:26:44.007968+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:23:19.506558
License: Public Domain

Justice Rehnquist,
with whom Justice O’Connor joins, concurring.
Unlike our Brothers White and Stevens, we believe that the District Court is not obligated to rule on every llth-hour petition for habeas corpus before it denies a stay. But assuming that the merits of the Witherspoon aspect of Judge Phillips’ order granting the stay are necessarily before us, we find that nothing in the material presented by respondent would show that the particular jurors who sat in his case were “less than neutral with respect to guilt.” Witherspoon v. Illinois, 391 U. S. 510, 520, n. 18 (1968). Absent such a showing, there can be no claim that respondent was denied this aspect of his right to a fair and impartial jury under the Sixth and Fourteenth Amendments, or that he would be subject to cruel and unusual punishment under the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments.