SCOTUS 23-175: 6-3 Concurring

Does a city’s enforcement of public camping against involuntarily homeless people violate the Eighth Amendment’s protection against cruel and unusual punishment?

SCHEDULE CHANGE BY SCOTUS: Earlier in the Week, SCOTUS added Wednesday to Thursday and Friday for publishing their Decisions. On Friday, Cheif Justice Roberts announced the coming Monday (01 July) will be the last day for Decisions to be published.

Facts of the Case

The city of Grants Pass in southern Oregon has a population of approximately 38,000, and of that population, somewhere between 50 and 600 persons are unhoused. Whatever the exact number of unhoused persons, however, it exceeds the number of available shelter beds, requiring that at least some of them sleep on the streets or in parks. However, several provisions of the Grants Pass Municipal Code prohibit them from doing so, including an “anti-sleeping” ordinance, two “anti-camping” ordinances, a “park exclusion” ordinance, and a “park exclusion appeals” ordinance.

In September 2018, a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit decided Martin v. City of Boise, holding that “the Eighth Amendment prohibits the imposition of criminal penalties for sitting, sleeping, or lying outside on public property for homeless individuals who cannot obtain shelter.” While the Grants Pass Municipal Code provisions impose only civil penalties, they still can mature into criminal penalties.

A district court certified a class of plaintiffs of involuntarily unhoused persons living in Grants Pass and concluded that, based on the unavailability of shelter beds, the City’s enforcement of its anti-camping and anti-sleeping ordinances violated the Cruel and Unusual Punishment Clause. A panel of the Ninth Circuit affirmed, and the Ninth Circuit denied rehearing en banc.

Question

1. Does the Magnuson-Stevens Act authorize the National Marine Fisheries Service to promulgate a rule that would require industry to pay for at-sea monitoring programs?

2. Should the Court overrule Chevron v. Natural Resources Defense Council or at least clarify whether statutory silence on controversial powers creates an ambiguity requiring deference to the agency?

Syllabus

CITY OF GRANTS PASS, OREGON v. JOHNSON ET AL.,

ON BEHALF OF THEMSELVES AND ALL OTHERS

SIMILARLY SITUATED

CERTIORARI TO THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR

THE NINTH CIRCUIT

No. 23–175. Argued April 22, 2024—Decided June 28, 2024

Opinion of the Court Delivered By Gorsuch

Homelessness is complex. Its causes are many. So may be the public policy responses required to address it. At bottom, the question this case presents is whether the Eighth Amendment grants federal judges primary responsibility for assessing those causes and devising those responses. It does not. Almost 200 years ago, a visitor to this country remarked upon the “extreme skill with which the inhabitants of the United States succeed in proposing a common object to the exertions of a great many men, and in getting them voluntarily to pursue it.” 2 A. de Tocqueville, Democracy in America 129 (H. Reeve transl. 1961). If the multitude of amicus briefs before us proves one thing, it is that the American people are still at it. Through their voluntary associations and charities, their elected representatives and appointed officials, their police officers and mental health professionals, they display that same energy and skill today in their efforts to address the complexities of the homelessness challenge facing the most vulnerable among us.

Yes, people will disagree over which policy responses are best; they may experiment with one set of approaches only to find later another set works better; they may find certain responses more appropriate for some communities than others. But in our democracy, that is their right. Nor can a handful of federal judges begin to “match” the collective wisdom the American people possess in deciding “how best to handle” a pressing social question like homelessness. Robinson, 370 U. S., at 689 (White, J., dissenting). The Constitution’s Eighth Amendment serves many important functions, but it does not authorize federal judges to wrest those rights and responsibilities from the American people and in their place dictate this Nation’s homelessness policy. The judgment below is reversed, and the case is remanded for further proceedings consistent with this opinion.

It is so ordered.

Thomas, Concurring

For its part, the Court of Appeals concluded that the Cruel and Unusual Punishments Clause governs these civil penalties because they can “later . . . become criminal offenses.” 72 F. 4th 868, 890 (CA9 2023). But, that theory rests on layer upon layer of speculation. It requires reasoning that because violating one of the ordinances “could result in civil citations and fines, [and] repeat violators could be excluded from specified City property, and . . . violating an exclusion order could subject a violator to criminal trespass prosecution,” civil fines and park exclusion orders therefore must be governed by the Cruel and Unusual Punishments Clause. Id., at 926 (O’Scannlain, J., statement respecting denial of rehearing en banc) (emphasis added). And, if this case is any indication, the possibility that a civil fine turns into a criminal trespass charge is a remote one. The respondents assert that they have been involuntarily homeless in Grants Pass for years, yet they have never received a park exclusion order, much less a criminal trespass charge. See ante, at 11.

Because the respondents’ claims fail either way, the Court does not address the merits of the Court of Appeals’ theory. See ante, at 16–17, and n. 4. Suffice it to say, we have never endorsed such a broad view of the Cruel and Unusual Punishments Clause. Both this Court and lower courts should be wary of expanding the Clause beyond its text and original meaning.

Sotomayor, Kagan, Jackson Dissenting

Homelessness in America is a complex and heartbreaking crisis. People experiencing homelessness face immense challenges, as do local and state governments. Especially in the face of these challenges, this Court has an obligation to apply the Constitution faithfully and evenhandedly. The Eighth Amendment prohibits punishing homelessness by criminalizing sleeping outside when an individual has nowhere else to go. It is cruel and unusual to apply any penalty “selectively to minorities whose numbers are few, who are outcasts of society, and who are unpopular, but whom society is willing to see suffer though it would not countenance general application of the same penalty across the board.” Furman v. Georgia, 408 U. S. 238, 245 (1972) (Douglas, J., concurring). I remain hopeful that our society will come together “to address the complexities of the homelessness challenge facing the most vulnerable among us.” Ante, at 34. That responsibility is shared by those vulnerable populations, the States and cities in which they reside, and each and every one of us. “It is only after we begin to see a street as our street, a public park as our park, a school as our school, that we can become engaged citizens, dedicating our time and resources for worthwhile causes.” M. Desmond, Evicted: Property and Profit in the American City 294 (2016). This Court, too, has a role to play in faithfully enforcing the Constitution to prohibit punishing the very existence of those without shelter. I remain hopeful that someday in the near future, this Court will play its role in safeguarding constitutional liberties for the most vulnerable among us. Because the Court today abdicates that role, I respectfully dissent.