Two challenges to the constitutionality of the 1994 legislation were involved in the 5-4 decisions. One was brought by Leandro Andrade, who had been sentenced to 50 years without parole for stealing children’s videotapes. The other was filed by Gary Ewing, who got 25 years for taking some golf clubs. The two men charged that their convictions violated the Eighth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, barring "cruel and unusual punishment."

Ewing had previously appealed unsuccessfully to the California Court of Appeals. In Andrade’s case, on the other hand, the Ninth Circuit appeals court in San Francisco had ruled in the convicted man’s favor, stating that the sentence was "grossly disproportionate."

The California district attorney, William Lockyer, a Democrat, argued before the Supreme Court that this decision violated provisions of the 1996 Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act, which had narrowed the grounds for allowing such appeals to cases where "lower-court judges have unreasonably applied a clearly established federal law," reported the Christian Science Monitor.

"Two consecutive terms of 25 years to life," wrote Justice Sandra Day O’Connor in the majority opinion, is "not an unreasonable application of our clearly established law." The approach to sentencing, she added, "is generally a policy choice to be made by state legislatures, not federal courts."  
 
How is it justice?
"Every year since March 7, 1994, we’ve held a march and rally to protest this law," Gail Blackwell, FACTS director of operations, told the Militant in a phone interview. "How is it justice to give someone 50 years for stealing videotapes?

"We have on our database lists of people whose ‘third strike’ includes being charged for stealing milk for their babies," she said. "One person’s ‘third strike’ was a charge of falsifying his DMV [Department of Motor Vehicles] registration."

In opposing the decision, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) of Southern California called for "voters...to take responsibility for fixing" the law. A statement from the ACLU, which was co-counsel in Andrade’s legal defense, said the organization was working "for three strikes reform at the ballot box" that would limit its application to "violent offenders."

These laws were enacted in the 1990s as part of a wave of "get-tough-on-crime" legislation. In that period the federal government and 26 states approved legislation mandating prison sentences of 25 years to life for third convictions.

In 1996 U.S. president William Clinton bragged before an audience of the Fraternal Order of Police, "We passed the three-strikes-and-you-are-out law. We are indicting people, convicting people under it." His administration also sponsored bills in 1994 and 1996 that restricted the right of appeal for prisoners, and rolled back Fourth Amendment protections from illegal search and seizure.

The legislation also extended capital punishment to include 60 federal crimes. "We expanded the death penalty," Clinton told the same crowd.

More than 7,000 people are serving 25 years or longer under California’s three-strikes law. They include more than 300 inmates whose third strike was a misdemeanor. Some inmates have been locked up for 25 years to life for pilfering a bottle of vitamins, a magazine, or some other cheap commodity.

The laws have been applied disproportionately to working people, particularly Blacks and Latinos. In California for example, African-Americans, who are 7 percent of the state’s population, comprise more than 31 percent of its prisoners, and 44 percent of those locked away under the "three-strikes" legislation.

"Blacks and Mexicans get 25 years for possessing crack cocaine the size of your finger tip while a white person would get one year or even probation for being caught with much more cocaine powder," Blackwell told the Militant. "Many people jailed for petty offenses don’t have the money to hire a lawyer to get them out" and clear their name, she said, "so they cop a plea and wind up with a police record."

"My brother was put away for half a gram of cocaine. He was an addict, but he had a job, a family, and he never hurt anyone," said Jose Verduzgo, a warehouse worker in California, in an interview with FreshAngles, an online magazine. "Now he is buried alive, and he won’t get out until he is 80."

The three-strikes laws and other legislation have resulted in a ballooning U.S. prison population, now standing at more than 2 million. In 2001 some 6.6 million people were caught up in the prison system, whether on probation, behind bars, or on parole. At 3.1 percent of the adult population, that makes Washington the world’s top jailer.  
 
 
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