Ramos Not Retroactive; Second Teague Exception Is Dead
Today, the U.S. Supreme Court decided in Edwards v. Vannoy, No. 19-5807, that the rule it established last year that the Constitution requires that criminal case juries must be unanimous is not retroactive to overturn cases that were already final on appeal when Ramos v. Louisiana was decided.
The holding is correct beyond question if one correctly applies the Court’s precedents under Teague v. Lane. For the full details, see the series of posts I wrote after the oral argument:
An Easy Retroactivity Case Made Difficult — Part III, Teague‘s Phantom Exception
Today, the ghostbusters have finally purged the phantom. The Court has finally taken the step that I have urged many times since Teague and admitted that the “second exception” for “watershed rules” is not merely comatose, it is dead. It has been dead for a long time, but the false promise required attorneys to brief it and courts to decide it in every habeas retroactivity case.
Justice Kavanaugh wrote the opinion of the Court. Justices Thomas and Gorsuch wrote concurrences with further thoughts on habeas corpus, each joined by the other.
The dissent is written by Justice Kagan and joined by Justices Breyer and Sotomayor. This is interesting because they split in Ramos itself. In that case, Justice Kagan was in the dissent on the grounds of precedent. Justices Breyer and Sotomayor joined the lead opinion, which all but decided that Ramos would not be retroactive on habeas corpus, as today’s majority points out.
The dissent claims that the majority is turning its back on precedent, and it abandons the “watershed exception” because it so clearly would apply that abandoning it is the only way to reach the result. That is utter nonsense. The “watershed exception” has been held not to apply to cases more fundamental than Ramos, as the majority explains. The Court could have quite easily decided this case against retroactivity simply by applying the established precedents on the second exception. It is the dissent’s position that runs counter to those precedents.
Officially pronouncing the “watershed rule” exception dead, as everyone knows it has been for a long time, is good judicial housekeeping. It was not necessary to reach the result.
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