Saffle v. Parks/Opinion of the Court

by Anthony Kennedy

The issue before us is whether respondent Robyn Leroy Parks, whose conviction and death sentence became final in 1983, is entitled to federal habeas relief. His claim is that an instruction in the penalty phase of his trial, telling the jury to avoid any influence of sympathy, violates the Eighth Amendment. In Penry v. Lynaugh, 492 U.S. 302, 109 S.Ct. 2934, 106 L.Ed.2d 256 (1989), we held that a new rule of constitutional law will not be applied in cases on collateral review unless the rule comes within one of two narrow exceptions. This limitation on the proper exercise of habeas corpus jurisdiction applies to capital and noncapital cases. See id., at 314, 109 S.Ct. at 2944. We hold that Parks is not entitled to federal habeas relief. The principle he urges is a new rule within the meaning of Teague v. Lane, 489 U.S. 288, 109 S.Ct. 1060, 103 L.Ed.2d 334 (1989). It is not dictated by our prior cases and, were it to be adopted, it would contravene well-considered precedents. We also hold that the rule petitioner asks us to adopt does not come within either of the two exceptions set forth in Teague.

A passing motorist found Abdullah Ibrahim, a native of Bangladesh, dead inside the Oklahoma City gas station where Ibrahim worked. The victim died from a single chest wound inflicted by a .45-caliber pistol. Parks admitted the murder to a friend, and the police obtained tapes of that statement. Parks said that he shot Ibrahim because he was afraid Ibrahim would tell the police that Parks used a stolen credit card to purchase gasoline.

In 1978, a jury found Parks guilty of capital murder. During the sentencing phase of the trial, Parks offered as mitigating evidence the testimony of his father, who described Parks' background and character. Parks' counsel relied upon this testimony in his closing argument, arguing that Parks' youth, race, school experiences, and broken home were mitigating factors that the jury should consider in making its sentencing decision. He asked the jury to show "kindness" to Parks in consideration of his background.

After instructing the jury that it must consider all of the mitigating circumstances, statutory or nonstatutory, proffered by Parks, and that it could consider any mitigating circumstances that it found from the evidence, the trial court delivered the following instruction:

"You are the judges of the facts. The importance and worth of the evidence is for you to determine. You must avoid any influence of sympathy, sentiment, passion, prejudice, or other arbitrary factor when imposing sentence. You should discharge your duties as jurors impartially, conscientiously and faithfully under your oaths and return such verdict as the evidence warrants when measured by these Instructions." App. 13.

After finding as an aggravating circumstance that the murder was "committed for the purpose of avoiding or preventing a lawful arrest or prosecution," Okla.Stat., Tit. 21, § 701.12 (1981), the jury sentenced Parks to death.

Parks' conviction and sentence were affirmed on direct appeal by the Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals, Parks v. State, 651 P.2d 686 (1982), and we denied certiorari, 459 U.S. 1155, 103 S.Ct. 800, 74 L.Ed.2d 1003 (1983). After seeking postconviction relief in the state courts, Parks filed a petition for a writ of habeas corpus in Federal District Court arguing, inter alia, that the antisympathy instruction delivered in the penalty phase violated the Eighth Amendment because it in effect told the jury to disregard the mitigating evidence that Parks had presented. The District Court denied relief, and a divided panel of the Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit affirmed. Parks v. Brown, 840 F.2d 1496 (1988). On rehearing, the Tenth Circuit sitting en banc reversed, holding that the antisympathy instruction was unconstitutional for the reasons advanced by Parks. Parks v. Brown, 860 F.2d 1545 (1988). We granted certiorari, 490 U.S. 1034, 109 S.Ct. 1930, 104 L.Ed.2d 402 (1989), and now reverse.

Parks petitions the federal courts for a writ of habeas corpus. As he is before us on collateral review, we must first determine whether the relief sought would create a new rule under our holdings in Teague v. Lane, supra, 489 U.S., at 299-301, 109 S.Ct., at 1069-1070, and Penry, supra, 492 U.S., at 313, 109 S.Ct., at 2944. If so, we will neither announce nor apply the new rule sought by Parks unless it would fall into one of two narrow exceptions. Teague, supra, 489 U.S., at 307, 109 S.Ct., at 1073; Penry, supra, 492 U.S., at 329, 109 S.Ct., at 2952.

In Teague, we defined a new rule as a rule that "breaks new ground," "imposes a new obligation on the States or the Federal Government," or was not "dictated by precedent existing at the time the defendant's conviction became final." Teague, supra, 489 U.S., at 301, 109 S.Ct., at 1070 (plurality opinion) (emphasis in original). The explicit overruling of an earlier holding no doubt creates a new rule; it is more difficult, however, to determine whether we announce a new rule when a decision extends the reasoning of our prior cases. As we recognized in Butler v. McKellar, 494 U.S. 407, 412-414, 110 S.Ct. 1212, 1216-1217, 108 L.Ed.2d 347 (1990), the question must be answered by reference to the underlying purposes of the habeas writ. Foremost among these is ensuring that state courts conduct criminal proceedings in accordance with the Constitution as interpreted at the time of the proceedings. See ibid. " '[T]he threat of habeas serves as a necessary additional incentive for trial and appellate courts throughout the land to conduct their proceedings in a manner consistent with established constitutional standards. In order to perform this deterrence function, . . . the habeas court need only apply the constitutional standards that prevailed at the time the original proceedings took place.' " Teague, supra, 489 U.S., at 306, 109 S.Ct., at 1073 (quoting Desist v. United States, 394 U.S. 244, 262-263, 89 S.Ct. 1030, 1040-1041, 22 L.Ed.2d 248 (1969) (Harlan, J., dissenting). See also Solem v. Stumes, 465 U.S. 638, 653, 104 S.Ct. 1338, 1347, 79 L.Ed.2d 579 (1984) (Powell, J., concurring in judgment). "The 'new rule' principle therefore validates reasonable, good-faith interpretations of existing precedents made by state courts even though they are shown to be contrary to later decisions." Butler, supra, 494 U.S., at 414, 110 S.Ct., at 1217. Under this functional view of what constitutes a new rule, our task is to determine whether a state court considering Parks' claim at the time his conviction became final would have felt compelled by existing precedent to conclude that the rule Parks seeks was required by the Constitution.

Parks contends that the result he seeks does not involve the creation of a new rule. Relying upon our decisions in Lockett v. Ohio, 438 U.S. 586, 98 S.Ct. 2954, 57 L.Ed.2d 973 (1978), and Eddings v. Oklahoma, 455 U.S. 104, 102 S.Ct. 869, 71 L.Ed.2d 1 (1982), both decided before his conviction became final in 1983, and our decision in California v. Brown, 479 U.S. 538, 107 S.Ct. 837, 93 L.Ed.2d 934 (1987), decided after his conviction became final, Parks argues that the Eighth Amendment, as interpreted in 1983, required, and still requires, that jurors be allowed to base the sentencing decision upon the sympathy they feel for the defendant after hearing his mitigating evidence. We disagree and conclude that adoption of this principle would create a new rule as defined in Teague and Penry.

In Lockett, a plurality of the Court decided that an Ohio death penalty statute that limited the jury's consideration to specified mitigating circumstances violated the constitutional requirement of individualized sentencing in capital cases. See 438 U.S., at 605, 98 S.Ct., at 2965. The plurality based its conclusion on the view that "the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments require that the sentencer . . . not be precluded from considering, as a mitigating factor, any aspect of a defendant's character or record and any of the circumstances of the offense that the defendant proffers as a basis for a sentence less than death." Id., at 604, 98 S.Ct., at 2964-2965 (emphasis in original; footnotes omitted).

In Eddings, the view adopted by the Lockett plurality ripened into a holding of the Court. We ruled that a sentencing judge's refusal, as a matter of law, to consider mitigating evidence presented by a capital defendant concerning his family history and upbringing was constitutional error. Relying on the plurality opinion in Lockett, the Court reasoned:

"Just as the State may not by statute preclude the sentencer from considering any mitigating factor, neither may the sentencer refuse to consider, as a matter of law, any relevant mitigating evidence. In this instance, it was as if the trial judge had instructed a jury to disregard the mitigating evidence Eddings proffered on his behalf. The sentencer . . . may determine the weight to be given relevant mitigating evidence. But they may not give it no weight by excluding such evidence from their consideration." Eddings, supra, 455 U.S., at 113-115, 102 S.Ct., at 876-877 (emphasis in original).

Review of our decisions in Lockett and Eddings convinces us that the two cases do not dictate the result urged by Parks. There is no dispute as to the precise holding in each of the two cases: that the State cannot bar relevant mitigating evidence from being presented and considered during the penalty phase of a capital trial. These two cases place clear limits on the ability of the State to define the factual bases upon which the capital sentencing decision must be made. Indeed, that is how we have interpreted these decisions in later cases. See Hitchcock v. Dugger, 481 U.S. 393, 398-399, 107 S.Ct. 1821, 1824-1825, 95 L.Ed.2d 347 (1987) (instruction to advisory jury not to consider nonstatutory mitigating circumstances, and refusal by sentencing judge to consider the same); Skipper v. South Carolina, 476 U.S. 1, 4-5, 106 S.Ct. 1669, 1670-1671, 90 L.Ed.2d 1 (1986) (exclusion of evidence regarding defendant's postoffense conduct).

Lockett and Eddings do not speak directly, if at all, to the issue presented here: whether the State may instruct the sentencer to render its decision on the evidence without sympathy. Parks asks us to create a rule relating, not to what mitigating evidence the jury must be permitted to consider in making its sentencing decision, but to how it must consider the mitigating evidence. There is a simple and logical difference between rules that govern what factors the jury must be permitted to consider in making its sentencing decision and rules that govern how the State may guide the jury in considering and weighing those factors in reaching a decision. We thus cannot say that the large majority of federal and state courts that have rejected challenges to antisympathy instructions similar to that given at Parks' trial have been unreasonable in concluding that the instructions do not violate the rule of Lockett and Eddings. See Byrne v. Butler, 847 F.2d 1135, 1138-1140 (CA5 1988); People v. Emerson, 122 Ill.2d 411, 442-443, 119 Ill.Dec. 250, 263, 522 N.E.2d 1109, 1122 (1987), cert. denied, 488 U.S. 900, 109 S.Ct. 246, 102 L.Ed.2d 235 (1988); State v. Ramseur, 106 N.J. 123, 295 -299, 524 A.2d 188, 275-277 (1987); State v. Steffen, 31 Ohio St.3d 111, 125, 509 N.E.2d 383, 396 (1987), cert. denied, 485 U.S. 916, 108 S.Ct. 1089, 99 L.Ed.2d 250 (1988); State v. Owens, 293 S.C. 161, 169, 359 S.E.2d 275, 279, cert. denied, 484 U.S. 982, 108 S.Ct. 496, 98 L.Ed.2d 495 (1987); State v. Porterfield, 746 S.W.2d 441, 450-451 (Tenn.), cert. denied, 486 U.S. 1017, 108 S.Ct. 1756, 100 L.Ed.2d 218 (1988). Even were we to agree with Parks' assertion that our decisions in Lockett and Eddings inform, or even control or govern, the analysis of his claim, it does not follow that they compel the rule that Parks seeks. See Butler, 494 U.S., at 414-415, 110 S.Ct., at 1217-1218.

Parks contends that our decision in Penry that the relief sought there did not call for the creation of a new rule compels a similar result in this case. We disagree. In Penry, we held that resolution of a claim that the Texas death penalty scheme prevented the jury from considering and giving effect to certain types of mitigating evidence did not involve the creation of a new rule under Teague. See Penry, 492 U.S., at 315, 109 S.Ct., at 2945. To the extent that Penry's claim was that the Texas system prevented the jury from giving any mitigating effect to the evidence of his mental retardation and abuse in childhood, the decision that the claim did not require the creation of a new rule is not surprising. Lockett and Eddings command that the State must allow the jury to give effect to mitigating evidence in making the sentencing decision; Penry's contention was that Texas barred the jury from so acting. Here, by contrast, there is no contention that the State altogether prevented Parks' jury from considering, weighing, and giving effect to all of the mitigating evidence that Parks put before them; rather, Parks' contention is that the State has unconstitutionally limited the manner in which his mitigating evidence may be considered. As we have concluded above, the former contention would come under the rule of Lockett and Eddings; the latter does not.

Penry's claim, moreover, did not ask us to apply the reasoning of Lockett and Eddings so much as it required us to apply our decision in Jurek v. Texas, 428 U.S. 262, 96 S.Ct. 2950, 49 L.Ed.2d 929 (1976). Penry interpreted Jurek as holding that the Texas death penalty statute is constitutional so long as it is interpreted by the Texas courts to permit the jury to consider mitigating circumstances proffered by the defendant. See Penry, supra, 492 U.S., at 318, 109 S.Ct., at 2946. Having thus construed Jurek, we concluded that resolution of Penry's claim that "those assurances were not fulfilled in his particular case," 492 U.S., at 318, 109 S.Ct., at 2947 (emphasis in original), did not involve the creation of a new rule:

"In our view, the relief Penry seeks does not 'impos[e] a new obligation' on the State of Texas. Rather, Penry simply asks the State to fulfill the assurance upon which Jurek was based: namely, that the special issues would be interpreted broadly enough to permit the sentencer to consider all of the relevant mitigating evidence a defendant might present in imposing sentence." Id., at 315, 109 S.Ct., at 2945 (citations omitted).

The Penry Court's conclusion that Lockett and Eddings dictated the rule sought by Penry, see 492 U.S., at 318-319, 109 S.Ct., at 2947, must be understood in terms of the Court's ruling in Jurek, and its application in later cases. We did not view Lockett and Eddings as creating a rule different from that relied upon in Jurek; rather, we indicated that Lockett and Eddings reaffirmed the reasoning in Jurek, see 492 U.S., at 317-319, 109 S.Ct., at 2946-2947, and confirmed the necessity of its application to Penry's claim.

We also reject Parks' contention that the antisympathy instruction runs afoul of Lockett and Eddings because jurors who react sympathetically to mitigating evidence may interpret the instruction as barring them from considering that evidence altogether. This argument misapprehends the distinction between allowing the jury to consider mitigating evidence and guiding their consideration. It is no doubt constitutionally permissible, if not constitutionally required, see Gregg v. Georgia, 428 U.S. 153, 189-195, 96 S.Ct. 2909, 2932-2935, 49 L.Ed.2d 859 (1976) (opinion of Stewart, Powell, and STEVENS, JJ.), for the State to insist that "the individualized assessment of the appropriateness of the death penalty [be] a moral inquiry into the culpability of the defendant, and not an emotional response to the mitigating evidence." California v. Brown, 479 U.S., at 545, 107 S.Ct., at 841 (O'CONNOR, J., concurring). Whether a juror feels sympathy for a capital defendant is more likely to depend on that juror's own emotions than on the actual evidence regarding the crime and the defendant. It would be very difficult to reconcile a rule allowing the fate of a defendant to turn on the vagaries of particular jurors' emotional sensitivities with our longstanding recognition that, above all, capital sentencing must be reliable, accurate, and nonarbitrary. See Gregg, supra, 428 U.S., at 189-195, 96 S.Ct., at 2932-2935; Proffitt v. Florida, 428 U.S. 242, 252-253, 96 S.Ct. 2960, 2966-2967, 49 L.Ed.2d 913 (1976) (opinion of Stewart, Powell, and STEVENS, JJ.); Jurek v. Texas, supra, 428 U.S., at 271-272, 96 S.Ct., at 2956 (same); Woodson v. North Carolina, 428 U.S. 280, 303-305, 96 S.Ct. 2978, 2990-2991, 49 L.Ed.2d 944 (1976) (plurality opinion); Roberts v. Louisiana, 428 U.S. 325, 333-335, 96 S.Ct. 3001, 3006-3007, 49 L.Ed.2d 974 (1976) (plurality opinion). At the very least, nothing in Lockett and Eddings prevents the State from attempting to ensure reliability and nonarbitrariness by requiring that the jury consider and give effect to the defendant's mitigating evidence in the form of a "reasoned moral response," Brown, 479 U.S., at 545, 107 S.Ct., at 841 (emphasis in original), rather than an emotional one. The State must not cut off full and fair consideration of mitigating evidence; but it need not grant the jury the choice to make the sentencing decision according to its own whims or caprice. See id., at 541-543, 107 S.Ct., at 839-840.

Given the above discussion, it is obvious that our decision in California v. Brown is of no assistance to Parks. In Brown, we held that an instruction telling the jury not to be "swayed by 'mere sentiment, conjecture, sympathy, passion, prejudice, public opinion or public feeling' " during the sentencing phase did not violate the Eighth Amendment. See id., at 542, 107 S.Ct., at 840. We reasoned that a reasonable juror would interpret the instruction to ignore mere sympathy "as an admonition to ignore emotional responses that are not rooted in the aggravating and mitigating evidence," and that it was not unconstitutional for a State to "prohibi[t] juries from basing their sentencing decisions on factors not presented at the trial." Id., at 542-543, 107 S.Ct., at 840. Although we approved of the use of the antisympathy instruction given in Brown, Parks attempts to transform our reasoning in that case into a rule that the instruction given in his case violates the Eighth Amendment.

Parks' argument relies upon a negative inference: because we concluded in Brown that it was permissible under the Constitution to prevent the jury from considering emotions not based upon the evidence, it follows that the Constitution requires that the jury be allowed to consider and give effect to emotions that are based upon mitigating evidence. For the reasons discussed above, see supra, at 488-491, we doubt that this inference follows from Brown or is consistent with our precedents. The same doubts are shared by the clear majority of federal and state courts that have passed upon the constitutionality of antisympathy instructions after Brown. See supra, at 490-491. The fact remains, however, that even if we accept Parks' arguments, Brown itself was decided nearly four years after Parks' conviction became final. In order to gain the benefit, if any, of Brown, Parks must establish that the decision in Brown did not create a new rule. To do so, Parks must contend that Lockett and Eddings dictated our reasoning, albeit perhaps not the result, in Brown. Our discussion above makes it evident that they do not.

Having decided that the relief Parks seeks would necessitate the creation of a new rule, we must determine whether the rule would come within either of the two exceptions to the general principle that new rules will not be applied on collateral review. The first exception permits the retroactive application of a new rule if the rule places a class of private conduct beyond the power of the State to proscribe, see Teague, 489 U.S., at 311, 109 S.Ct., at 1075, or addresses a "substantive categorical guarante[e] accorded by the Constitution," such as a rule "prohibiting a certain category of punishment for a class of defendants because of their status or offense." Penry, 492 U.S., at 329, 330, 109 S.Ct., at 2953. Parks cannot invoke this exception. The rule sought by Parks would neither decriminalize a class of conduct nor prohibit the imposition of capital punishment on a particular class of persons. See Butler, 494 U.S., at 415, 110 S.Ct., at 1218; cf. Penry, supra, 492 U.S., at 329-330, 109 S.Ct., at 2952.

The second exception is for "watershed rules of criminal procedure" implicating the fundamental fairness and accuracy of the criminal proceeding. See Teague, supra, 489 U.S., at 311, 109 S.Ct., at 1076 (plurality opinion); Butler, supra, 494 U.S., at 416, 110 S.Ct., at 1218. This exception is also inapplicable here. Although the precise contours of this exception may be difficult to discern, we have usually cited Gideon v. Wainwright, 372 U.S. 335, 83 S.Ct. 792, 9 L.Ed.2d 799 (1963), holding that a defendant has the right to be represented by counsel in all criminal trials for serious offenses, to illustrate the type of rule coming within the exception. See, e.g., Teague, supra, 489 U.S., at 311-312, 109 S.Ct., at 1075-1076 (plurality opinion); Stumes, 465 U.S., at 653-654, and n. 4, 104 S.Ct., at 1347-1348, and n. 4 (Powell, J., concurring in judgment). Whatever one may think of the importance of respondent's proposed rule, it has none of the primacy and centrality of the rule adopted in Gideon or other rules which may be thought to be within the exception. The objectives of fairness and accuracy are more likely to be threatened than promoted by a rule allowing the sentence to turn not on whether the defendant, in the eyes of the community, is morally deserving of the death sentence, but on whether the defendant can strike an emotional chord in a juror.

The judgment of the Court of Appeals is therefore reversed.

It is so ordered.

Justice BRENNAN, with whom Justice MARSHALL joins, and with whom Justice BLACKMUN and Justice STEVENS join except as to Part IV, dissenting.

Notes