Breyer Doesn’t Leave Clear ‘Liberal’ Criminal Law Legacy

Justice Stephen Breyer will be remembered for speaking out against the death penalty, but when it comes to criminal law across the board, don’t call him a liberal.

Breyer’s tendency to defer to the government means he sometimes sides with the authorities in close cases, including on matters of search and seizure, trial rights, and sentencing.

“Although usually labeled ‘liberal,’ Justice Breyer has not been predictably so in the criminal justice area,” said Christopher Slobogin, director of the criminal justice program at Vanderbilt Law School in Nashville.

“More often than not he has sided with criminal defendants, but nowhere ...