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Civil Liberties

Civil Liberties. POLS 21: The American Political System. “They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.” —Benjamin Franklin. Capital Punishment by Country. Why does the United States have capital punishment?.

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Civil Liberties

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  1. Civil Liberties POLS 21: The American Political System “They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.” —Benjamin Franklin

  2. Capital Punishment by Country

  3. Why does the United States have capital punishment? …because of our POLITICAL INSTITUTIONS The Constitution grants legislative power over criminal law to the states. That means that the abolition of capital punishment would require each state to repeal its own capital punishment laws.

  4. Why does the United States have capital punishment? • Social science demonstrates that capital punishment: • Fails to deter crime • Expensive to administer • Often racially unjust • Irrevocable but fallible • Ultimately, support for capital punishment decisions are made for political and cultural reasons.

  5. Capital Punishment The 8th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution states: Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted. Acts of torture, degradation, excessive suffering Arbitrary and capricious sentencing guidelines

  6. Burning at the stake Crucifixion Guillotine Drawing and quartering

  7. Is Capital Punishment “Cruel and Unusual”? • Electric chair • Gas chamber • Lethal injection • Hanging • Firing squad

  8. ‘Agonizing Experiment’: Execution with Untested Drug Takes 25 Minutes During those 25 minutes, the Columbus Dispatch reported that McGuire was “struggling and gasping loudly for air, making snorting and choking sounds that lasted for at least 10 minutes, with his chest heaving and his fist clenched. Deep, rattling sounds emanated from his mouth.” The family of the condemned man has been considering a lawsuit over the execution, as it has been “deeply disturbed by” what happened and “believes it violated his constitutional rights…”

  9. Between 1972 and 1976, there was a de facto moratorium on capital punishment following the Court’s decision in Furman v. Georgia (1972).

  10. Furman v. Georgia (1972) “These death sentences are cruel and unusual in the same way that being struck by lightning is cruel and unusual. For all the people convicted of rapes and murders in 1967 and 1968, many just as reprehensible as these, the petitioners are among a capriciously selected random handful upon whom the sentence of death has in fact been imposed. My concurring Brothers have demonstrated that, if any basis can be discerned for the selection of these few to be sentenced to death, it is the constitutionally impermissible basis of race … But racial discrimination has not been proved, and I put it to one side. I simply conclude that the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments cannot tolerate the infliction of a sentence of death under legal systems that permit this unique penalty to be so wantonly and so freakishly imposed.” —Justice Potter Stewart

  11. Gregg v. Georgia (1976) • Sentencing guidelines must provide objective criteria to direct and limit the sentence discretion. This must in turn to be assured in the appellate review of all death sentences; • Sentencing guidelines must also allow the judge or jury to take into account the character of an individual defendant. Today, this is the criteria used to limit the scope of capital punishment: forbidding it for rape; restricting it for juveniles and the mentally impaired, etc.

  12. Does this suggest an “unusual” standard? Is it geographically arbitrary?

  13. Is Capital Punishment Racist?

  14. Does Capital Punishment Deter Crime? Murder is more common in states with capital punishment than in those where it is not used.

  15. Is Capital Punishment Cost Effective? How does the cost of imposing the death penalty compare to a sentence of life in prison without the possibility of parole (LWOP)?

  16. “What we are paying for at such great cost is essentially our own ambivalence about capital punishment. We try to maintain the apparatus of state killing and another apparatus that almost guarantees that it won't happen. The public pays for both sides.” — Frank Zimring

  17. How Often are Prisoners Wrongfully Executed? Since 1973, over 139 people have been released from death row with new-found evidence of their innocence.

  18. In what has become known as the “Marshall Hypothesis,” Justice Thurgood Marshall argues that if Americans understood how the death penalty works in practice, knew the discriminatory manner in which it is administered, and realized it does not serve as a deterrent, that “the great mass of citizens would conclude… that the death penalty is immoral and therefore unconstitutional.”

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