The Irrationality of Punishing Homelessness–Julie A. Nice: The Supreme Court upheld the criminalization of public survival by unhoused people in City of Grants Pass v. Johnson  in June 2024. This article examines that decision and considers why Grants Pass had not enforced its camping ban against unhoused people when the author visited the city one year later. One important reason is that Oregon had enacted legislation requiring that any camping bans in the state be objectiv

Abstract : The Supreme Court upheld the criminalization of public survival by unhoused people in City of Grants Pass v. Johnson in June 2024. This article examines that decision and considers why Grants Pass had not enforced its camping ban against unhoused people when the author visited the city one year later. One important reason is that Oregon had enacted legislation requiring that any camping bans in the state be objectively reasonable considering the totality of circums

Abstract : The brief and ambiguous wording of the Eighth Amendment has permitted courts to adopt a variety of interpretations. These interpretations have been applied inconsistently through different periods of the Amendment’s history, but the U.S. Supreme Court has never established a singular, definitive method for interpreting the Amendment. That is, until the 2024 decision in City of Grants Pass, Oregon v. Johnson, where the Court rejects any interpretation of the Eighth

Abstract : This article examines the intensifying criminalization of homelessness in the United States since the Supreme Court’s 2024 decision in Grants Pass v. Johnson , which removed the ability of people to challenge laws under the Eighth Amendment’s Cruel and Unusual Punishment Clause that prohibit survival behaviors in public places like sitting, sleeping, or lying down. The article explores the legal and practical challenges in documenting criminalization of homelessnes