48
Breyer, J., dissenting
Cf. Harmelin, 501 U. S., at 998-999, 1001 (noting "the primacy of the legislature" in making sentencing policy).
I can find no such special criminal justice concerns that might justify this sentence. The most obvious potential justification for bringing Ewing's theft within the ambit of the statute is administrative. California must draw some kind of workable line between conduct that will trigger, and conduct that will not trigger, a "three strikes" sentence. "But the fact that a line has to be drawn somewhere does not justify its being drawn anywhere." Pearce v. Commissioner, 315 U. S. 543, 558 (1942) (Frankfurter, J., dissenting). The statute's administrative objective would seem to be one of separating more serious, from less serious, triggering criminal conduct. Yet the statute does not do that job particularly well.
The administrative line that the statute draws separates "felonies" from "misdemeanors." See Brief for Respondent 6 ("The California statute relies, fundamentally, on traditional classifications of certain crimes as felonies"). Those words suggest a graduated difference in degree. But an examination of how California applies these labels in practice to criminal conduct suggests that the offenses do not necessarily reflect those differences. See United States v. Watson, 423 U. S. 411, 438-441 (1976) (Marshall, J., dissenting) (felony/misdemeanor distinction often reflects history, not logic); Rummel, 445 U. S., at 284 ("The most casual review of the various criminal justice systems now in force in the 50 States of the Union shows that the line dividing felony theft from petty larceny, a line usually based on the value of the property taken, varies markedly from one State to another"). Indeed, California uses those words in a way unrelated to the seriousness of offense conduct in a set of criminal statutes called " 'wobblers,' " see ante, at 16, one of which is at issue in this case.
Most "wobbler" statutes classify the same criminal conduct either as a felony or as a misdemeanor, depending upon
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