WASHINGTON — Justice John Paul Stevens quietly marked his 89th birthday last week by showing once again his powerful influence on the law.
Over the last decade, he has led a series of liberal victories on issues such as the death penalty, gay rights and Guantanamo Bay -- and he has done it on a court that often leans to the right. Many times his views have prevailed, even decades after he staked out his position.
In 1981, he had warned in dissent that the Supreme Court was taking a "dangerous detour" when it said police could search a car whenever they arrested the driver or an occupant. This "massive broadening" of police power would turn ordinary traffic stops into car searches, he predicted.
It took 28 years, but Stevens spoke for a 5-4 majority on Tuesday, setting aside the earlier decision and limiting car searches during an arrest. The 4th Amendment protects the privacy of Americans against "unreasonable searches," and there is no good reason to permit routine searches inside a car just because a suspect is handcuffed and standing outside the car, he wrote.
With patience and persistence, the court's oldest justice has been determined to make U.S. law more fair and humane.
Duke University School of Law Dean David F. Levi noted that Stevens, a Chicago native, was often described as a "maverick or a loner" in the decade after he joined the court in 1975.
"Now that we see the arc of a long career, I think most observers would be struck by his ability to turn his lonely dissents into majority opinions in the fullness of time," he said.
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A maverick's history
In 1989, for example, he dissented when the court upheld the death penalty for murderers who were mentally retarded or under age 18. These defendants deserve to be imprisoned, but they do not deserve the ultimate punishment of executions, he said.
In 2002, he spoke for the court in a decision that abolished executions for the mentally retarded. Three years later, he assigned to Justice Anthony M. Kennedy the 5-4 opinion ending executions for juvenile murderers.
Gay rights followed a similar pattern. In 1986, Stevens strongly dissented when the court upheld a Georgia anti-sodomy law and said gays had no protected rights under the Constitution. Stevens continued to condemn that decision, and in 2003, the court overturned it.
