Callins v. Collins
510 U.S. 1141 (1994)
Rule of Law:
The administration of the death penalty is inherently unconstitutional because the Eighth Amendment's contradictory requirements for guided discretion to ensure consistency and for individualized sentencing to permit mercy are fundamentally irreconcilable.
Facts:
- Bruce Edwin Callins was involved in the robbery of a tavern.
- During the robbery, Callins shot and killed a man.
- The victim was shot suddenly and without warning.
- The victim was left to bleed to death on the floor of the tavern.
Procedural Posture:
- Bruce Edwin Callins was convicted of murder and sentenced to death in a Texas state trial court.
- The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals, the state's highest court for criminal cases, affirmed the conviction and sentence on direct appeal.
- Callins unsuccessfully sought post-conviction relief in state courts.
- Callins then filed a petition for a writ of habeas corpus in federal district court, which was denied.
- The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit affirmed the denial of habeas relief.
- Callins filed a petition for a writ of certiorari with the U.S. Supreme Court, which the Court denied without a written opinion.
Premium Content
Subscribe to Lexplug to view the complete brief
You're viewing a preview with Rule of Law, Facts, and Procedural Posture
Issue:
Does the administration of the death penalty, under the Court's conflicting Eighth Amendment precedents that require both guided discretion to prevent arbitrariness and individualized discretion to grant mercy, violate the Constitution?
Opinions:
Concurring - Justice Scalia
No, the administration of the death penalty does not violate the Constitution. The text of the Fifth Amendment explicitly permits capital punishment by stating that no person shall be deprived of 'life' without due process of law, which establishes that it is not 'cruel and unusual punishment' under the Eighth Amendment. If the Court's precedents, such as Furman v. Georgia and Lockett v. Ohio, have created an irreconcilable legal conflict, the proper conclusion is not that the constitutionally permitted death penalty is invalid, but that at least one of the judicially created, non-textual commands is wrong. The personal moral convictions of judges are not a valid basis for reading prohibitions into the Constitution that contradict its text and the will of the people.
Dissenting - Justice Blackmun
Yes, the death penalty as currently administered violates the Constitution. After twenty years of attempting to regulate capital punishment, it is clear that the system remains 'fraught with arbitrariness, discrimination, caprice, and mistake.' The Court's constitutional commands are in irreconcilable conflict: Furman requires consistency and guided discretion to eliminate arbitrariness, while Lockett requires individualized sentencing and unbridled discretion to grant mercy. These principles are inversely related, as a step toward one is a step away from the other. Because this paradox cannot be resolved and results in a system plagued by racial bias and error, the death penalty experiment has failed and cannot be administered in accordance with the Constitution.
Analysis:
Justice Blackmun's dissent is one of the most significant individual opinions in modern death penalty jurisprudence, marking his personal renunciation of capital punishment after years of voting to uphold it. While not a binding precedent, it powerfully frames the central paradox of capital punishment law: the tension between the need for consistency (Furman) and individualized mercy (Lockett). This opinion has become a cornerstone for academic and legal critiques of the death penalty, popularizing the argument that the entire post-Gregg legal framework is a 'failed experiment' that is impossible to administer fairly.
Gunnerbot
AI-powered case assistant
Loaded: Callins v. Collins (1994)
Try: "What was the holding?" or "Explain the dissent"