Cite as: 506 U. S. 40 (1992)
Scalia, J., dissenting
ruary 1985 to support the view that an appellate court in a weighing State "was permitted to apply a rule of automatic affirmance to any death sentence supported by multiple aggravating factors, when one is invalid." Id., at 231. Under Stringer, the concurring Arizona Supreme Court justices cannot be excused for their failure to reweigh; any reasonable jurist should have known that "automatic affirmance" in a weighing State violates the Eighth Amendment.*
I joined the dissent in Stringer, and I continue to think that case was wrongly decided. In particular, I remain convinced that Stringer transformed Teague's retroactivity principle from a rule that validates "reasonableness" into a rule that mandates "prescience." 503 U. S., at 244 (Souter, J., dissenting). Had Stringer been decided differently, petitioner could not now complain that two Arizona Supreme Court justices violated the Constitution in 1983 by neglecting to reweigh. Nevertheless, because Stringer is good law, and because I agree that the concurring justices in this case did not reweigh, I join the Court's opinion.
Justice Scalia, dissenting.
The Court today holds that Justice Cameron's special concurrence erred in that, after having found that this murder was not committed in an "especially heinous, cruel or depraved manner," Ariz. Rev. Stat. Ann. § 13-703(F)(6) (1989), it failed thereupon to reweigh the remaining aggravating and mitigating circumstances before affirming petitioner's death sentence. The Court does not reach petitioner's claim that Chief Justice Holohan's opinion erred in applying the Arizona
*Richmond's conviction became final on November 14, 1983—15 months before Stringer's conviction became final. I cannot imagine, however, that this distinction renders Stringer inapplicable to this case. The decision in Stringer rested on the premise that the rule against automatic affirmance "emerges not from any single case," but from a "long line of authority," Stringer v. Black, 503 U. S., at 232, and that "line of authority" consists entirely of cases decided before Richmond's conviction became final, see id., at 227-232.
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