56
Ginsburg, J., concurring in judgment
State's proof of the elements of the crime." Id., at 233- 234 (citation omitted).
See also 272 Mont., at 122-123, 900 P. 2d, at 265. This passage can be explained in various ways—e. g., as an assertion that the right to have a jury consider self-defense evidence (unlike the right to have a jury consider evidence of voluntary intoxication) is fundamental, a proposition that the historical record may support. But the only explanation needed for present purposes is the one given in Kokkonen v. Guardian Life Ins. Co., 511 U. S. 375, 379 (1994): "It is to the holdings of our cases, rather than their dicta, that we must attend." If the Martin dictum means that the Due Process Clause requires all relevant evidence bearing on the elements of a crime to be admissible, the decisions we have discussed show it to be incorrect.
* * *
"The doctrines of actus reus, mens rea, insanity, mistake, justification, and duress have historically provided the tools for a constantly shifting adjustment of the tension between the evolving aims of the criminal law and changing religious, moral, philosophical, and medical views of the nature of man. This process of adjustment has always been thought to be the province of the States." Powell v. Texas, 392 U. S. 514, 535-536 (1968) (plurality opinion). The people of Montana have decided to resurrect the rule of an earlier era, disallowing consideration of voluntary intoxication when a defendant's state of mind is at issue. Nothing in the Due Process Clause prevents them from doing so, and the judgment of the Supreme Court of Montana to the contrary must be reversed. It is so ordered.
Justice Ginsburg, concurring in the judgment. The Court divides in this case on a question of characterization. The State's law, Mont. Code Ann. § 45-2-203 (1995),
Page: Index Previous 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 NextLast modified: October 4, 2007