How is homelessness a constitutional issue?

The 8th Amendment prohibits certain methods of punishment for a crime. For example, the court ruled in 2005 that imposing the death penalty on a youth under age 18 was cruel and unusual punishment.

In a 1962 case from Los Angeles, the Supreme Court ruled for the first time that labeling some things as a “crime” may itself constitute cruel and unusual punishment.

In that case, two L.A. police officers had arrested Larry Robinson and reported that his arm was discolored by needle marks, though they had seen no direct evidence that he‘d been using drugs. He was convicted and sent to jail for 90 days under a California law that, among other things, made it crime to “use narcotics or to be addicted to the use of narcotics.”

In Robinson vs. Los Angeles, the justices struck down the part of the law that made “the status of narcotic addiction” a crime.

The 9th Circuit cited that precedent in ruling that cities may not punish people for the status of being homeless.

“As long as there is no option of sleeping indoors, the government cannot criminalize indigent, homeless people for sleeping outdoors on public property,” the court said in 2018.

What are the legal issues the Supreme Court will need to sort out?

That depends on who you ask.

Advocates for the homeless describe the rulings from Boise and Grants Pass as narrow and limited, and say their impact has been exaggerated by cities seeking to divert attention from their own failings.

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