‘The Supreme Court announced on Thursday that it will not decide Hamm v. Smith, a case involving a genuinely difficult constitutional question about whether an Alabama inmate may lawfully be executed. The immediate upshot of this decision is that Joseph Clifton Smith, who’s at the heart of this case, will not be killed. Smith prevailed in the federal appeals court that previously heard his case. And the fact that the justices decided not to decide Hamm — they dismissed it “as improvidently granted,” to use the Court’s precise legal terminology — means that Smith’s victory in the lower court stands….’ (Ian Millhiser via Vox)