Byron White

“ The ripple effect on society caused by possession of drugs, through related crimes, lost productivity, health problems, and the like, is often not the direct consequence of possession, but of the resulting addiction, something which this Court held in Robinson v. California, 370 U.S., at 660-667, 82 S.Ct., at 1417-1420, cannot be made a crime.
To be constitutionally proportionate, punishment must be tailored to a defendant's personal responsibility and moral guilt. ”

“ The "absolute magnitude" of petitioner's crime is not exceptionally serious. Because possession is necessarily a lesser included offense of possession with intent to distribute, it is odd to punish the former as severely as the latter. Cf. Solem, 463 U.S., at 293, 103 S.Ct., at 3011. Nor is the requisite intent for the crime sufficient to render it particularly grave. To convict someone under the possession statute, it is only necessary to prove that the defendant knowingly possessed a mixture containing narcotics which weighs at least 650 grams. ”

“ In the absence of all express regulations on the subject, it would surely be absurd to imprison an individual for a term of years, for some inconsiderable offence, and consequently it would seem, that a law imposing so severe a punishment must be contrary to the intention of the framers of the constitution. ”

“ Indeed, only when a comparison is made with penalties for other crimes and in other jurisdictions can a court begin to make an objective assessment about a given sentence's constitutional proportionality, giving due deference to "public attitudes concerning a particular sentence." ”

“ But Solem recognized that
" [f] or sentences of imprisonment, the problem is not so much one of ordering, but one of line-drawing. It is clear that a 25-year sentence generally is more severe than a 15-year sentence, but in most cases it would be difficult to decide that the former violates the Eighth Amendment while the latter does not. Decisions of this kind, although troubling, are not unique to this area. The courts are constantly called upon to draw similar lines in a variety of contexts." ”

“ Even if one were to accept the argument that the First Congress did not have in mind the proportionality issue, the evidence would hardly be strong enough to come close to proving an affirmative decision against the proportionality component. ”

“ It is one thing to uphold a checkpoint designed to detect drivers then under the influence of a drug that creates a present risk that they will harm others. It is quite something else to uphold petitioner's sentence because of the collateral consequences which might issue, however indirectly, from the drugs he possessed. ”

“ While the collateral consequences of drugs such as cocaine are indisputably severe, they are not unlike those which flow from the misuse of other, legal, substances. ”

“ Thus, the Court has held that a drunken driver who has been prosecuted for traffic offenses arising from an accident cannot, consistent with the Double Jeopardy Clause, subsequently be prosecuted for the death of the accident victim. ”

“ Although " [i] ntent to deliver can be inferred from the amount of a controlled substance possessed by the accused," People v. Abrego, 72 Mich.App. 176, 181, 249 N.W.2d 345, 347 (1976) , the inference is one to be drawn by the jury, see People v. ”