Today in History: The Death Penalty

On this day (June 29) in 1972, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that the arbitrary and inconsistent imposition of the death penalty constituted cruel and unusual punishment. The case was Furman v. Georgia and involved a man convicted of murder while committing a burglary. In unsworn statements, Furman gave two accounts of what happened. He either fell and the gun accidentally discharged or he fired blindly, killing the home owner. Two other cases, Branch v. Texas and Jackson v. Georgia were consolidated with Furman v. Georgia. Both of these death penalty sentences resulted from rape, not murder.

In the 5-4 decision, a majority of the judges agreed that the death penalty was cruel and unusual punishment, but none could agree with another as to why this was the case. Therefore, they wrote five separate concurring decisions. The result was that all death penalty sentences were reduced to life in prison (except in California where the California Supreme Court had already found the death penalty to be unconstitutional and converted the sentences of everyone on death row to life in prison).

37 states responded to Furman v. Georgia by passing new death penalty laws which defined criteria that had to be considered in death penalty cases and California held a referendum which reinstituted the death penalty so in 1976 new death penalty cases arrived at the Supreme Court. Opponents hoped that the court would outlaw the death penalty completely, but the opposite happened. William Douglas (appointed by FDR) had retired and been replaced by John Paul Stevens (appointed by Gerald Ford). In Gregg v. Georgia, the court found that the death penalty was constitutional so long as the criteria for giving the punishment were objective (and checked by an appellate court) and the character and record of the defendant were taken into account by the sentencer.