Cite as: 523 U. S. 272 (1998)
Opinion of Stevens, J.
sonal or political animosity, or the deliberate fabrication of false evidence would be constitutionally acceptable. Like Justice O'Connor, I respectfully disagree with that conclusion.
I
The text of the Due Process Clause properly directs our attention to state action that may "deprive" a person of life, liberty, or property. When we are evaluating claims that the State has unfairly deprived someone of liberty or property, it is appropriate first to ask whether the state action adversely affected any constitutionally protected interest. Thus, we may conclude, for example, that a prisoner has no "liberty interest" in the place where he is confined, Mea-chum v. Fano, 427 U. S. 215 (1976), or that an at-will employee has no "property interest" in his job, Bishop v. Wood, 426 U. S. 341 (1976). There is, however, no room for legitimate debate about whether a living person has a constitutionally protected interest in life. He obviously does.
Nor does Connecticut Bd. of Pardons v. Dumschat, 452 U. S. 458 (1981), counsel a different conclusion. In that case the Court held that a refusal to commute a prison inmate's life sentence was not a deprivation of his liberty because the liberty interest at stake had already been extinguished. Id., at 461, 464. The holding was supported by the "crucial distinction between being deprived of a liberty one has, as in parole, and being denied a conditional liberty one desires." Greenholtz v. Inmates of Neb. Penal and Correctional Complex, 442 U. S. 1, 9 (1979).2 That "crucial distinction" points
2 "Our language in Greenholtz leaves no room for doubt: 'There is no constitutional or inherent right of a convicted person to be conditionally released before the expiration of a valid sentence. The natural desire of an individual to be released is indistinguishable from the initial resistance to being confined. But the conviction, with all its procedural safeguards, has extinguished that liberty right: "[G]iven a valid conviction, the criminal defendant has been constitutionally deprived of his liberty." ' 442 U. S., at 7 (emphasis supplied; citation omitted). Greenholtz pointedly dis-
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