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"It is proper that we acknowledge the overwhelming weight of international opinion against the juvenile death penalty ..."

Why? Since when do U.S. courts subject their interpretation of the U.S. Constitution to the influence of international opinion? I'm with dissenting Justice Antonin Scalia, who said it makes no sense to grant more weight to the views of foreigners than to our own state legislatures. The majority's reasoning could have detrimental implications if it becomes customary to base U.S. judicial opinions on other countries' laws.

That said, I agree with the majority that by evolving U.S. standards the execution of juvenile offenders has become sufficiently rare to qualify as cruel and unusual punishment. There have been only 22 such executions since 1985, and those have been carried out in just a handful of states. Clearly, a national consensus has developed that these executions should cease.

One more point bothers me. It is the majority's argument of "diminished culpability." It rests on the contention that "the character of a juvenile is not as well formed as that of an adult. The personality traits of juveniles are more transitory, less fixed."

Because of these and other factors - lack of maturity, underdeveloped sense of responsibility, susceptibility to negative influences - Kennedy asserted that the juvenile makeup renders suspect "any conclusion that a juvenile falls among the worst offenders."

Such an opinion of the unformed juvenile character comes just when we're talking about character education in Guilford County Schools. I hope we have expectations of good character among students, and especially those who are 16 and 17 years old. By that age, they should have a very clear idea of the distinction between right and wrong. Sadly, some teenagers have shown they are capable of committing the most horrendous crimes. Should it be assumed that they don't know any better because of their age, or that they are less certain that murder is an inappropriate way to deal with others? The law already has means to determine whether defendants of any age are incapable of distinguishing right from wrong. Should we now make it a hard and fast rule that ALL individuals younger than 18 lack the capacity for making such judgments?

Again, I agree with the Supreme Court's ruling and am not sorry to see an end to executions of individuals who were younger than 18 when they committed their crimes. I worry, however, that this decision might be used to oppose tough punishment of any kind for juvenile offenders. While it is tragic to condemn a young person to a life sentence or some other long term in prison, we are talking about individuals who in many cases are every bit as dangerous to society as are older offenders.

So I'm not completely comfortable with the direction indicated by the Supreme Court's decision.