Abstract
The United States is the only Western, industrialized nation still executing criminal offenders. The Constitutional provision that is most often used to call the appropriateness of capital punishment in the United States into question is the 8th Amendment, which prohibits cruel and unusual punishment. Opponents of capital punishment have often argued various reasons why the death penalty is a cruel punishment, but the Supreme Court of the United States has not agreed. A new approach to abolition advocacy is needed. Since the death penalty has not been determined cruel, I submit a new legal argument based on the unusual nature of capital punishment. Utilizing systems theory, I posit the death penalty is an unusual criminal punishment due to the extraordinary range of persons beyond merely the defendant who are negatively impacted by executions.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Arrigo, B. A., & Fowler, C. R. (2001). The “death row community”: A community psychology perspective. Deviant Behavior, 22(1), 43–71.
Bedau, H. A. (1983). Crime and punishment: Berger’s defense of the death penalty: How not to read the Constitution. Michigan Law Review, 81, 1152–1165.
Bedau, H. A. (1996). Interpreting the 8th Amendment: Principled vs. populist strategies. Thomas M. Cooley Law Review, 13, 789–813.
Berger, R. (1982). Death penalties: The Supreme Court’s obstacle course. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
Bohm, R. (1987). American death penalty attitudes: A critical examination of recent evidence. Criminal Justice & Behavior, 14(3), 380–396.
Bohm, R. M., Clark, L. J., & Aveni, A. F. (1991). Knowledge and death penalty opinion: A test of the Marshall hypothesis. Journal of Research in Crime & Delinquency, 28(3), 360–387.
Brennan, W. J. (1986). The 1986 Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. lecture: Constitutional adjudication and the death penalty: A view from the court. Harvard Law Review, 100, 313–331.
Cusack, R. M. (2000). Stress and stress symptoms in capital murder jurors: Is jury duty hazardous to jurors’ mental health? Dissertation Abstracts International, 60, 8-B.
Dennis, B. G. (2000). Mitigation in capital murder cases: War of the quality worlds. International Journal of Reality Therapy, 20(1), 22–26.
Dworkin, R. (1999). The moral reading and the majoritarian premise. In H. H. Koh & R. C. Slye (Eds.), Deliberative democracy and human rights (pp. 81–115). New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.
Eisenberg, T., Garvey, S. P., & Wells, M. T. (1996). Jury responsibility in capital sentencing: An empirical study. Buffalo Law Review, 44, 339–380.
Ellsworth, P. C., & Gross, S. R. (1994). Hardening of the attitudes: Americans’ views on the death penalty. Journal of Social Issues, 50(2), 19–52.
Furman v. Georgia (1972). 408 US 238.
Gallemore, J. L., Panton, J. H., & Kaufman, E. (1972). Inmate responses to lengthy death row confinement. American Journal of Psychiatry, 129(2), 167–172.
Gregg v. Georgia (1976). 428 US 153.
Haag, E. (1985). The death penalty once more. University of California, Davis Law Review, 18, 957–972.
Hoffman, J. L. (1995). The capital jury project: Where’s the buck?—Juror misperception of sentencing responsibility in death penalty cases. Indiana Law Journal, 70, 1137–1160.
Katz, D., & Kahn, R. L. (1978). The social psychology of organizations. New York: Wiley.
King, B. (1998). Cutting the chain of violence, organizing the religious communityagainst the death penalty: Vision ‘98. Philadelphia, PA: American Friends Service Committee.
King, R., & Norgard, K. (1999). What about our families? Using the impact on death row defendants’ family members as a mitigating factor in death penalty sentencing hearings. Florida State University Law Review, 26, 1119–1175.
Kuebler-Ross, E. (1970). On death and dying. New York: Macmillan Publishing Co.
Layne, C. M., Pynoos, R. S., & Cardenas, J. (2001). Wounded adolescence: School-based group psychotherapy for adolescents who sustained or witnessed violent injury. In M. Shafii & S. L. Shafii (Eds.), School violence: Assessment, management, prevention (pp. 163–188). Washington, DC: American Psychiatric Press.
Liebman, J. S., Fagan, J., & West, V. (2000). A broken system. Error rates in capital cases, 1973–1995. New York: Columbia University Law School.
Manley, S. R. (1999). The Constitution, the punishment of death, and misguided “Originalism”. Law Review of Michigan State University-Detroit College of Law, 1999, 913–944.
Marbury v. Madison (1803). 5 US 137.
McGarrell, E. F., & Sandys, M. (1996). The misperception of public opinion toward capital punishment. American Behavioral Scientist, 39(4), 500–513.
Rosen, E. J. (1991). Families facing terminal illness. In F. H. Brown (Ed.), Reweaving the family tapestry: A multigenerational approach to families (pp. 262–285). New York: Norton.
Sunstein, C. (1999). One case at a time: Judicial minimalism on the Supreme Court. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
Tushnet, M. (1999). Taking the Constitution away from the courts. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
USA Today (1996, January 25). Firing squad gets prepared (pp. A3).
Weems v. United States (1910). 217 US 349.
Zimring, F. E., & Hawkins, G. (1986). Capital punishment and the American agenda. New York: Cambridge University Press.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Boys, S. The Death Penalty: An Unusual Punishment America is Inflicting Upon Itself. Crit Crim 19, 107–118 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10612-010-9115-7
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10612-010-9115-7