The case will have much wider implications, though. In four other states -- Florida, Alabama, Delaware and Indiana -- a much larger number of people are on death row, sentenced by judges who first received recommendations from juries. But a large number of those facing death in those states were put there by judges who overrode jury recommendations of life sentences.

"The court didn't deal directly with those states," said Ring's victorious attorney Andrew Hurwitz, "but they will have to face it before long. All those people are going to be filing new appeals based on this decision."

Alan Dershowitz, a constitutional scholar and attorney at Harvard University, argues that the case will reach even further, to many of the people on death rows in the 31 other states in which juries do the sentencing. "This decision has broad implications for the whole process of jury trials," says Dershowitz. Explaining that the Supreme Court has now given constitutional authority to the fact-finding function of capital juries, he predicted: "You're going to see defense attorneys bring cases that challenge jury instructions, and that examine how juries reach their decisions about aggravating and mitigating circumstances, because the court has ruled that you have a constitutional right to a jury of your peers in your sentencing."

Surveying the latest decision, as well as the 6-3 decision by the court last week barring the execution of the mentally retarded, Diane Clements, the president of a Texas-based national pro-capital punishment organization called Justice for All, called the effect "very disturbing."

"We've all proceeded on the basis of case law that supported what we've done, and now the Supreme Court has done an about-face," she said. "How do you move forward now when there's no firm ground?

"I don't think the Supreme Court is going to overturn the death penalty," Clements added. "But they do seem to want to get rid of many of the death eligible cases."

Indeed, there are some who suspect that some conservative members of the high court may be trying to shore up the "core death penalty" by paring away the more legally and politically vulnerable cases, such as those it has eliminated with its last two decisions. Many constitutional scholars expect the court sooner or later to also ban the execution of underage killers.

"I'm sure they (the conservative justices) are trying to preserve the core of the death penalty by getting rid of problems," says Dershowitz. "But these decisions also do seem to suggest a change of attitude on the part of at least a few of the justices, who had once seemed hell-bent on opening up the process of executing people."

Dershowitz also speculates that several of the conservative justices may be trying to make decisions that would position them for consideration to replace Chief Justice Rehnquist, who is expected to retire soon. "With the position of chief justice opening up, they may be trying to move to the middle," he said.

Edward Lazarus, a former federal prosecutor who writes on Supreme Court issues, says the Supreme Court's recent death penalty decisions show both a "hardening" of the anti-death penalty positions of the court's four more liberal members, as well as a "softening" of the views of conservative Justices O'Connor and Kennedy. As a result, he says, "The anti-death penalty side really only needs one vote, either O'Connor or Kennedy, to prevail in any given case and the consequence will be, at least for the next few years, a substantial decrease in executions as death row inmates seek to take advantage of the new rulings."

Meanwhile, David Elliott, a spokesman for the National Campaign to Abolish the Death Penalty, cautions that the two recent decisions, while making this court "the most favorable on the death penalty in 25 years," do not herald any overturning of the nation's capital punishment system, which still has over 3,300 people awaiting execution. "We are making a mistake if we count on the Supreme Court to do that," Elliott said. "The only way capital punishment will be abolished is on a state-by-state basis through grass-roots organizing."

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