Capital Punishment: Furman V. Georgia

Capital punishment is define as the lawful infliction of death as a punishment. Death as a punishment has been long used by the United States throughout history. First historical evidence of the death penalty was in Jamestown during the colonial period. Death penalty has no current effect on the management of crime than any other punishment given. Different countries and states have many other viewpoints on the death penalty as far as morally and ethically. According the case, Furman v. Georgia which rules that death penalty polices of thirty-nine states are consider to be unconstitutional. It was seen as this punishment was cruel and unusual punishment under current state laws. Since this case had been determined the issues of controversy …show more content…
In an article, the NAACP Legal Defense and Education Fund had abundant of evidence showing racial bias in death sentencing. (Death Penalty Information Center, 1990) Researching believe that a minority person who kills a Caucasian person is much more likely to get the death penalty than it being vice versa. Also, the judge and the jury play a factor in the racial bias as well because some can possibly be prejudiced. Wrongly accused people have been put to death due to fault of the judicial racial bias. African Americans would still constitute the largest ethnic group among the executed, again in both in total numbers across the period and during most ten month periods. (Hugo Adam, …show more content…
It is a possibly that most mentally challenged criminals are incapable of understanding the nature of their crimes or actions. (2009 Allen, Clubb) Mental illness defense can sometimes be more harmful than good to the defendant in the sentencing proceedings of a capital trial. Some juries believe that mental illness is no excuse or they believe that the defendant could be faking it. In addition, some people believe that an individual could have gotten help before the occurrence of criminal violence. Mentally insane defenses can lead juries to think that the individual is a danger to society. Mentally illness itself is enough punishment. We do not execute the mentally ill because criminally or not they are unique group in society, deserving of special concerns, protection, and care. The exemption of the mentally incompetent from execution is a public and symbolic way of reaffirming consensual social commitments to make special efforts to understand and accept mentally ill, even if the acceptance is conditional on a term of long imprisonment. (Kent S. Miller,