Thomas, J., concurring in judgement
any servant or laborer (white or black) who loiters away his time or is stubborn or refractory.” Id., at 1621 (Rep. Myers). He also noted that Florida punished vagrants with “a fine not exceeding $500 and imprison[ment] for a term not exceeding twelve months, or by being sold for a term not exceeding twelve months, at the discretion of the court.” Ibid. At the time, such fines would have been ruinous for laborers. Cf. id., at 443 (Sen. Howe) (“A thousand dollars! That sells a negro for his life”).
These and other examples of excessive fines from the historical record informed the Nation’s consideration of the Fourteenth Amendment. Even those opposed to civil-rights legislation understood the Privileges or Immunities Clause to guarantee those “fundamental principles” “fixed” by the Constitution, including “immunity from… excessive fines.” 2 Cong. Rec. 384–385 (1874) (Rep. Mills); see also id., at App. 241 (Sen. Norwood). And every post-1855 state constitution banned excessive fines. S. Calabresi & S. Agudo, Individual Rights Under State Constitutions When the Fourteenth Amendment Was Ratified in 1868, 87 Texas L. Rev. 7, 82 (2008). The attention given to abusive fines at the time of the Fourteenth Amendment, along with the ubiquity of state excessive-fines provisions, demonstrates that the public continued to understand the prohibition on excessive fines to be a fundamental right of American citizenship. *** The right against excessive fines traces its lineage back in English law nearly a millennium, and from the founding of our country, it has been consistently recognized as a core right worthy of constitutional protection. As a constitutionally enumerated right understood to be a privilege of American citizenship, the Eighth Amendment’s prohibition on excessive fines applies in full to the States.
