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Appellate Review Of Legal But Excessive Sentences: A Comparative Study, Gerhard O.W. Mueller, Fre Le Poole

Vanderbilt Law Review

Classical penology was conceived in France in the eighteenth century, and then eclipsed all over the world in the nineteenth, when Lombroso conjured up the picture of the born criminal. It was finally laid to rest in the United States in the twentieth century. Its basic tenet had been simple enough: the legislature in its infinite wisdom would seek and find the appropriate punishment for every crime.This can be accomplished if a crime is defined narrowly enough, perhaps by the creation of subcategories of that crime, so as to encompass all potential perpetrators who will each incur the same amount …