470
Opinion of the Court
require that a limiting construction "defin[e] the terms of the statutory aggravating circumstance through objective standards." 947 F. 2d, at 884. "[C]old-blooded, pitiless slayer" fails, the court said, because it calls for a "subjective determination." Ibid. The court found further evidence of the Osborn construction's infirmity in its application to this case. In the Court of Appeals' view, the trial judge's findings that Jensen attacked Creech "without provocation" and that the murder " 'evidenc[ed] an excessive violent rage' " could not be reconciled with the conclusion that Creech was a "cold-blooded, pitiless" killer. 947 F. 2d, at 884. The Court of Appeals therefore found the "utter disregard" circumstance facially invalid. Id., at 884-885.
Three judges dissented from an order denying rehearing en banc. The dissenters argued that the panel had misconstrued both the "utter disregard" factor and this Court's prior decisions. Whether a defendant is a "cold-blooded, pitiless slayer," they said, is not a subjective inquiry; it is an evidentiary question to be determined from facts and circumstances. Id., at 890 (opinion of Trott, J.). The dissenters found the Osborn limiting construction indistinguishable from the construction this Court approved in Walton. 947 F. 2d, at 890. We granted certiorari, limited to the narrow question whether the "utter disregard" circumstance, as interpreted by the Idaho Supreme Court in Osborn, is unconstitutionally vague. See 504 U. S. 984 (1992).
II
This case is governed by the standards we articulated in Walton, supra, and Lewis v. Jeffers, 497 U. S. 764 (1990). In Jeffers we reaffirmed the fundamental principle that, to satisfy the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments, a capital sentencing scheme must " 'suitably direc[t] and limi[t]' " the sentencer's discretion " 'so as to minimize the risk of wholly arbitrary and capricious action.' " Id., at 774 (quoting Gregg v. Georgia, 428 U. S. 153, 189 (1976) ( joint opinion of Stewart,
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