SubscribeTwo other members of the gang were also sentenced to die. Two had their sentences commuted to life in prison. The sixth, Mr. Medellín’s brother, Vernacio, is serving a 40-year sentence.Hmm, why was this guy executed but not the others?
a Texas state legislator has introduced a bill to make it 11
The majority’s two holdings taken together produce practical anomalies. They unnecessarily complicate the President’s foreign affairs task insofar as, for example, they increase the likelihood of Security Council Avena enforcement proceedings, of worsening relations with our neighbor Mexico, of precipitating actions by other nations putting at risk American citizens who have the misfortune to be arrested while traveling abroad, or of diminishing our Nation’s reputation abroad as a result of our failure to follow the “rule of law” principles that we preach. The holdings also encumber Congress with a task (postratification legislation) that, in respect to many decisions of international tribunals, it may not want and which it may find difficult to execute. See supra, at 23–24 (discussing the problems with case-by-case legislation). At the same time, insofar as today’s holdings make it more difficult to enforce the judgments of international tribunals, including technical non-politically-controversial judgments, those holdings weaken that rule of law for which our Constitution stands.
“all Treaties … which shall be made … under the Authority of the United States, shall be the supreme Law of the Land; and the Judges in every State shall be bound thereby.” Art. VI, cl. 2. The Clause means that the “courts” must regard “a treaty … as equivalent to an act of the legislature, whenever it operates of itself without the aid of any legislative provision.”The alternative would be for all our national treaty partners to have to negotiate treaties with all 50 states separately. Um, yeah.
There is a great deal of wisdom in Justice Breyer’s dissent. I agree that the text and history of the Supremacy Clause, as well as this Court’s treaty-related cases, do not support a presumption against self-execution
. . .
One consequence of our form of government is that sometimes States must shoulder the primary responsibility for protecting the honor and integrity of the Nation. Texas’ duty in this respect is all the greater since it was Texas that—by failing to provide consular notice in accordance with the Vienna Convention—ensnared the United States in the current controversy. Having already put the Nation in breach of one treaty, it is now up to Texas to prevent the breach of another.
The decision in Avena merely obligates the United States “to provide, by means of its own choosing, review and reconsideration of the convictions and sentences of the [affected] Mexican nationals,” 2004 I. C. J., at 72, ¶153(9), “with a view to ascertaining” whether the failure to provide proper notice to consular officials “caused actual prejudice to the defendant in the process of administration of criminal justice,” id., at 60, ¶121. The cost to Texas of complying with Avena would be minimal, particularly given the remote likelihood that the violation of the Vienna Convention actually prejudiced José Ernesto Medelln. See ante, at 4–6, and n. 1. It is a cost that the State of Oklahoma unhesitatingly assumed.4
On the other hand, the costs of refusing to respect the ICJ’s judgment are significant. The entire Court and the President agree that breach will jeopardize the United States’ “plainly compelling” interests in “ensuring the reciprocal observance of the Vienna Convention, protecting relations with foreign governments, and demonstrating commitment to the role of international law.” Ante, at 28. When the honor of the Nation is balanced against the modest cost of compliance, Texas would do well to recognize that more is at stake than whether judgments of the ICJ, and the principled admonitions of the President of the United States, trump state procedural rules in the absence of implementing legislation.
The Court’s judgment, which I join, does not foreclose further appropriate action by the State of Texas.
Finally, Texas law authorizes a criminal defendant to seek postjudgment review. See Tex. Code Crim. Proc. Ann., Art. 11.071, §5(a)(1) (Vernon Supp. 2006). And Texas law provides for further review where American law provides a “legal basis” that was previously “unavailable.” See Ex parte Medelln, 223 S. W. 3d 315, 352 (Tex. Crim. App. 2006). Thus, I would send this case back to the Texas courts, which must then apply the Avena judgment as binding law.
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