Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®

Law Commons™

Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®

Criminal Procedure

2007

Eighth Amendment

Articles 1 - 2 of 2

Full-Text Articles in Law

The Eighth Amendment, The Death Penalty And Ordinary Robbery-Burglary Murderers: A California Case Study, Steven Shatz Aug 2007

The Eighth Amendment, The Death Penalty And Ordinary Robbery-Burglary Murderers: A California Case Study, Steven Shatz

Steven F. Shatz

Beginning with Furman v. Georgia, the Supreme Court's seminal case applying the Eighth Amendment to the death penalty, the Court has developed two principles limiting the states' power to define death-eligibility: the principle from Furman and Zant v. Stephens that states are required to "genuinely narrow" the death-eligible class to avoid the risk of arbitrariness in the imposition of the death penalty and the principle from Enmund v. Florida and Tison v. Arizona that the death penalty is a disproportionate punishment for a particular category of murders when it does not comport with contemporary values and serves no penological purpose. …

Go to article

The Legal, Political, And Social Implications Of The Death Penalty, Hon. William W. Wilkins May 2007

The Legal, Political, And Social Implications Of The Death Penalty, Hon. William W. Wilkins

University of Richmond Law Review

A recent national poll found that sixty-five percent of Americans favor the death penalty. That's down from eighty percent ten years ago. Moreover, the total favoring the death penalty dropped to fifty percent when those polled were asked to assume that thealternative to the death penalty was life in prison with no chance of parole. And, the number of death sentences imposed in the United States during the last few years has dropped to the lowest level since capital punishment was reinstated thirty years ago. Thus, it would seem that our society's attitude toward capital punishment is changing. What was …

Go to article