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Essay / Research Paper Abstract
This 10 page paper explains and discuses Amendment VIII of the U.S. Constitution, which reads: "Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted." The discussion centers on the phrase "cruel and unusual punishment." A great number of cases alleging cruel and unusual punishment have reached the level of the U.S. Supreme Court and it is from these cases that we derive at least partial interpretations of what would be considered an act that violates the Eighth Amendment. Cases discussed include: California's "Three Strikes, You're Out" law, the death penalty for mentally retarded persons, and punishments inflicted on prison inmates by their guards, among others. Bibliography lists 11 sources.
Page Count:
10 pages (~225 words per page)
File: MM12_PGamend8.rtf
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Unformatted sample text from the term paper:
phrase that has caused the most controversy. What exactly did the framers of the Constitution mean? What type of punishment constitutes "cruel and unusual"? Interpretations of what is meant
by any part of the Constitution are determined in courts. In 1878, the Court wrote: "Difficulty would attend the effort to define with exactness the extent of the constitutional provision
which provides that cruel and unusual punishments shall not be inflicted; but it is safe to affirm that punishments of torture [such as drawing and quartering, embowelling alive, beheading, public
dissecting, and burning alive], and all others in the same line of unnecessary cruelty, are forbidden by that amendment to the Constitution."ii Courts have been faced with numerous cases
alleging that the death penalty is cruel and unusual but as early as 1867, the court said that death by firing squad did not violate and later a court used
the 14th Amendment to hold that death by electrocution was permissible under the Constitution.iii But, as 2001 approached, only three states, Alabama, Georgia and Nebraska, still had the electric chair
as their only method to employ the death sentence and then, the Georgia Supreme Court ruled that this is cruel and unusual punishment.iv It was a close vote of 4
to 3, which means that not all justices on that court believed electrocution to be cruel and unusual punishment. This Court wrote that electrocution "inflicts purposeless physical violence and needless
mutilation."v Stephen Bright, a representative for the Southern Center for Human Rights, stated: "This decision ends the degrading spectacle of smoke, fire and burning flesh that almost every other modern
society in the world has abandoned."vi Like other states, Georgia has switched to lethal injection although it should be noted there are many states who give the prisoner a choice
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