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Opinion of Scalia, J.
factual matter. Since judgment is not based on findings which resolve some factual matter, it is not sufficient to establish legal entitlement to a life sentence. A default judgment does not trigger a double jeopardy bar to the death penalty upon retrial.' " 563 Pa., at 548, 763 A. 2d, at 367 (quoting Martorano, 535 Pa., at 194, 634 A. 2d, at 1070).
It could be argued, perhaps, that the statutorily required entry of a life sentence creates an "entitlement" even without an "acquittal," because that is what the Pennsylvania Legislature intended—i. e., it intended that the life sentence should survive vacation of the underlying conviction. The Pennsylvania Supreme Court, however, did not find such intent in the statute—and there was eminently good cause not to do so. A State's simple interest in closure might make it willing to accept the default penalty of life imprisonment when the conviction is affirmed and the case is, except for that issue, at an end—but unwilling to do so when the case must be retried anyway. And its interest in conservation of resources might make it willing to leave the sentencing issue unresolved (and the default life sentence in place) where the cost of resolving it is the empaneling of a new jury and, in all likelihood, a repetition of much of the guilt phase of the first trial—though it is eager to attend to that unfinished business if there is to be a new jury and a new trial anyway.
III
A
When Bullington, Rumsey, and Poland were decided, capital-sentencing proceedings were understood to be just that: sentencing proceedings. Whatever "hallmarks of [a] trial" they might have borne, Bullington, 451 U. S., at 439, they differed from trials in a respect crucial for purposes of the Double Jeopardy Clause: They dealt only with the sentence to be imposed for the "offence" of capital murder. Thus, in its search for a rationale to support Bullington and
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