A GOOD DAY FOR JUDICIAL DISCRETION

Equity is an elusive legal concept that occasionally allows some
leeway in applying the rules of the law and is often unappreciated by
judges who insist the law means only what it says. That was clear in
2008 when the United States Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit
refused to allow federal courts to consider a death-penalty
conviction of Albert Holland because his lawyer had inexcusably let
the filing deadline pass. Fortunately, seven members of the Supreme
Court proved less rigid in their thinking on Monday and reversed that
blinkered decision.

Mr. Holland, who was convicted of first-degree murder and is on
Florida's death row, continually asked his court-appointed lawyer
about the paperwork deadlines and pressed him to keep all options of
appeal open. But the lawyer barely communicated with his client and
missed the filing deadline set by Congress in 1996.

In giving Mr. Holland a second chance to make his case, the Supreme
Court acted in the highest legal tradition and demonstrated why
society invests so much hope in the wisdom of justices -- and not
just their knowledge of legal principles. Writing for the court's
majority, Justice Stephen Breyer said that a hard and fast adherence
to absolute legal rules could impose "the evils of archaic rigidity."

That was not enough for Justices Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas,
who dissented. They provided a clear illustration of what happens
when jurisprudence is stripped of all human empathy -- that recently
vilified but still vital heartbeat of the legal system. Justice
Scalia wrote that while it is tempting to tinker with technical rules
to achieve a just result, the Constitution does not give judges the
discretion to rewrite Congress's rules. The law is the law, in other
words, and tough luck if your incompetent lawyer leaves you hanging.

It was heartening to see that Chief Justice John Roberts Jr. and
Justice Samuel Alito Jr. refused to subscribe to that philosophy,
just as they have broken with Justice Scalia in other criminal justice cases.

The full court demonstrated that same spirit of understanding in
another opinion issued Monday, when it ruled that a minor drug
offense did not justify deporting a legal immigrant. The case was
brought by Jose Angel Carachuri-Rosendo, an immigrant from Mexico
found in possession of a single tablet of Xanax, the anti-anxiety
drug, without a prescription. Overruling the lower courts and
disagreeing with the Obama administration, the court said that the
possession did not qualify as a serious felony, even though Mr.
Carachuri-Rosendo had a previous misdemeanor conviction.

The decision gives hope to other immigrants fighting deportation on
minor charges that are taken far too seriously by the government.
Taken together, the outcome of Monday's cases suggests that even on a
conservative court, the letter of the law has its limits.