Powell v. Texas
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| Powell v. Texas | ||||||||||||
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| Argued March 7, 1968 Decided June 17, 1968 |
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| Holding | ||||||||||||
| The Texas law making it a crime of public intoxication did not constitute cruel and unusual punishment in violation of the Eighth Amendment. | ||||||||||||
| Court membership | ||||||||||||
| Chief Justice: Earl Warren Associate Justices: Hugo Black, William O. Douglas, John Marshall Harlan II, William J. Brennan, Jr., Potter Stewart, Byron White, Abe Fortas, Thurgood Marshall |
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| Case opinions | ||||||||||||
| Majority by: Marshall Joined by: Warren, Black, Harlan Concurrence by: Black Joined by: Harlan Concurrence by: White Dissent by: Fortas Joined by: Douglas, Brennan, Stewart |
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| Laws applied | ||||||||||||
| U.S. Const. amends. VIII | ||||||||||||
Powell v. Texas, 392 U.S. 514 (1968), was a United States Supreme Court case which ruled that a Texas statute criminalizing public intoxication did not violate the Eighth Amendment protection against cruel and unusual punishment. It was a 5-4 decision, and the majority opinion was by Justice Thurgood Marshall. Justice Hugo Black and Byron White each wrote separate concurring opinions, and Justice Abe Fortas dissented.
The court's majority concluded that, Powell, the defendant who was convicted of public intoxication, "was convicted, not for being a chronic alcoholic, but for being in public while drunk on a particular occasion", so the Texas statute was not criminalizing the condition of alcoholism alone, but instead punishing the defendant for his public behavior. The majority distinguished the case from the earlier case Robinson v. California, which ruled that drug addiction alone as a disease could not be criminalized.
