The Court’s amendments are here, together with a statement respecting the denial of reconsideration. The modified opinion is here. Only two Justices voted for rehearing, Alito and Thomas. Justice Scalia’s opinion concerning the denial of rehearing (joined by Chief Justice Roberts) is here, and includes the following:
I am voting against the petition for rehearing because the views of the American people on the death penalty for child rape were, to tell the truth, irrelevant to the majority’s decision in this case.The majority opinion, after an unpersuasive attempt to show that a consensus against the penalty existed, in the end came down to this: “[T]he Constitution contemplates that in the end our own judgment will be brought to bear on the question of the acceptability of the death penalty under the Eighth Amendment.” Ante, at ___ (slip op., at 24). Of course the Constitution contemplates no such thing; the proposed Eighth Amendment would have been laughed to scorn if it had read “no criminal penalty shall be imposed which the Supreme Court deems unacceptable.” But that is what the majority opinion said, and there is no reason to believe that absence of a national consensus would provoke second thoughts.
This is pretty much what I thought would happen: Certainly no surprises here. Thanks to Corey Yung for the links: Corey has additional commentary here.