From Capital News Service

WASHINGTON — In what advocates call the most important case on homelessness in 40 years, the Supreme Court must decide whether cities can punish the unhoused for sleeping in public when they have nowhere else to go.

The case comes from the small Oregon city of Grants Pass, which prohibits sleeping in public with so much as a blanket. After three homeless people filed a complaint, courts have blocked the city from enforcing the rule.

Grants Pass, supported by dozens of other cities and states, wants the Supreme Court to overturn a decision by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, which ruled that punishing homeless people for sleeping outside when they have nowhere else to go violates the Eighth Amendment’s ban on cruel and unusual punishment.