Hard-hitting speeches on the pressing moral and legal issues are a rarity for Supreme Court justices, and there is reason to expect that Justice O'Connor's was meant as a deliberate signal that she is willing to grapple with unfairness and error in the application of the death penalty. Next term the court faces two important death penalty cases. One addresses the constitutionality of executing the mentally retarded, which Justice O'Connor previously held not to violate the Eighth Amendment's bar against cruel and unusual punishment. The other concerns an inmate's claim that he was improperly represented by a lawyer with a conflict of interest.