The U. S. Supreme Court today reinstated a city ordinance against camping on public property, reversing decisions that had blocked enforcement of anti-camping ordinances in nine western states. Several states and cities joined the City of Grants Pass, Oregon, in seeking to overturn a 2019 Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals ruling (Martin v. City of Boise), which effectively gave the homeless an Eighth Amendment right to camp on public property. In 2019, the U. S. Supreme Court declined to hear a similar appeal from the City of Boise to review and overturn that ruling.

Justice Neil Gorsuch wrote the opinion of the Court in the case of City of Grants Pass v. Johnson. The opinion holds that “[u]nder Martin, judges take from elected representatives the questions whether and when someone who has committed a proscribed act with a requisite mental state should be ‘relieved of responsibility’ for lack of ‘moral culpability.’ ... And Martin exemplifies much of what can go wrong when courts try to resolve matters like those unmoored from any secure guidance in the Constitution.” The vote was 6-3, with Justices Sotomayor, Kagan, and Jackson dissenting.

In 2020, the City of Grants Pass appealed a federal judge’s ruling that cited Martin as requiring him to strike down local ordinances prohibiting camping on public property. In July 2023, a divided panel of the Ninth Circuit upheld the judge’s order.

This case has attracted an unusual amount of interest. In addition to the Criminal Justice Legal Foundation (CJLF), 35 other persons and organizations have submitted amicus curiae (friend of the court) briefs in support of the City of Grants Pass. Among them are a group of 24 states, numerous local governments and organizations of governments, state and federal legislators, and organizations seeking to help people rise out of homelessness and the mental and addictive conditions that contribute to it.

The CJLF brief, authored by Legal Director Kent Scheidegger, notes that the Eighth Amendment was adopted to bar the cruel and unusual punishment of convicted criminals, which has nothing to do with cities and counties enforcing municipal ordinances to regulate camping on public land. The brief also points out that the Ninth Circuit’s Martin ruling conflicts with a 2020 decision by the U. S. Supreme Court in which it endorsed a contrary interpretation of the main precedent in this case. The Court’s decision followed this reasoning.

The current level of homelessness is causing a serious negative impact in virtually every American city. These issues, and how the Ninth Circuit decisions hinder a positive response, are addressed in the briefs of the local governments and service organizations.

“The intractable problems of homelessness and related conditions are not helped by the unrealistic restrictions imposed by the Ninth Circuit on the pretense of enforcing the Eighth Amendment. The Ninth Circuit’s absurd misinterpretation in the Martin and Grants Pass decisions has caused catastrophic damage to communities in the West, and the Supreme Court’s correction is an important step toward restoration of public order,” said Scheidegger.