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The United States Supreme Court has not yet examined several aspects of the death penalty. One aspect is the ability for the state to forcefully medicate an incompetent inmate, which may result in the inmate appearing competent for execution. While the Supreme Court' ruled that it is unconstitutional to execute an inmate who is incompetent, inmates who would have had their executions vacated due to mental illness are executed because the state can put them on an involuntary medication regimen. According to many experts, involuntary medication regimens mask the affects of their illness instead of providing a cure. Experts often refer to this practice as the "chemical straitjacket." Because the effects of antipsychotic medication, inmates may be sedated to a point where they appear competent, but in reality, they are sedated to a point where their mental illness is still present yet undetectable. As a result, placing condemned inmates on involuntary medication regimens has the possibility to violate the inmate's Fifth, Sixth, Eighth and Fourteenth Amendment rights. The intent of this thesis is to examine whether the Supreme Court has successfully upheld its duty to promote a fair judicial system by allowing the medicate to execute scheme to continue. Through the analysis of case law, law review articles, and the American Constitution, this thesis will evaluate the treatment of condemned inmates who show signs of incompetence. Through analysis, this thesis aims to raise awareness to an issue that, in the opinion of this writer, deserves the attention of American courts and other governing bodies.

Capital punishment is a forceful moral issue that is frequently overlooked. This is possibly due to the reverence many have toward the rule of law or a passive acceptance of the status quo. In this thesis I will begin with a discussion of context to the topic of the death penalty in order to address potential biases. Then I examine not only the ethical merit of the death penalty but the foundational justifications for a system of criminal justice to show that the special relationship between the state and its citizens does not lend itself to or allow for the instantiation of the death penalty. I look first to several theories of punishment selecting the most viable theory in order to make the most plausible case in favor of the death penalty. From there I establish that there is some intuitive merit to the notion that the vicious deserve unhappiness and see how far that intuition might extend. In this section I examine the merits and demerits of Kantian retributivism in order to address the many intricate ethical and political issues involved in the death penalty debate. I’ve chosen the Kantian ethical framework because of the nuance with which many of the problems of retribution are solved. Kant insets the enlightenment principles into his moral framework and provides reasoned explanations for there insistence, as such his work provides a background from which I will work through details and resolve contradictions. I will then make an argument for the moral personhood of the state and sketch the special relationship it has to its citizens. Finally I will offer a system that incorporates the ideas developed in the previous sections and gives a practical answer to the death penalty debate. It is my ultimate argument that there is no absolute ban on the death penalty, possibly even some intuitive merit to the scheme, but ultimately many moral limitations on its implementation.

Across the country, African American defendants are being discriminated against in the criminal courts and by juries, particularly in capital cases.[1] This assertion is supported by two lines of research. First, an analysis of Supreme Court decisions focusing on the racial impact on voir dire. Second, social-legal studies on juror decision making have demonstrated legal and socio-legal histories providing evidence that demonstrate there is a racial bias in our system. Based on these findings, this paper sets forth several legal and policy recommendations to improve the fair adjudication of African American defendants charged with capital crimes. [1] Jack Glaser, Karin D. Martin, Kimberly B. Kahn, Possibility of Death Sentence Has Divergent Effect on Verdicts for Black and White Defendants (2015).

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About 1 in 10 murders in the United States are committed by a woman. Meanwhile, only about 1 in 50 death row inmates are women. This initially suggests that women are favored in capital cases. There have been two predominant viewpoints attempting to explain the statistical imbalance: on the one hand there is Rapaport’s theory of gender-related crime in relation to existing legal directives on what warrants a capital sentence; and on the other hand is Streib’s theory of chivalry, that women are receiving lenient treatment in capital cases because they are women. This study has examined both theories, and tested their validity, by analyzing statistics and other material supporting or opposing their respective claims. The entire study has been carried out through a feminist theoretical perspective, questioning how “gender” plays an active part in capital cases, and relating committed crime to the victim, subsequently finding that even though Rapaport and Streib advance different theories, neither theory supports a claim that favoritism is incorrect.

A 2008 Gallup poll places public support for the death penalty at 64 percent. Stemming from an observation of how little is known about the death penalty, this study sheds light on six key areas of the death penalty: cruel and unusual punishment, deterrence potential, innocence, discrimination, cost, and the challenges created for the legitimacy of America's moral leadership internationally in conjunction with our evolving standards of decency. Following a review of existing literature, six conclusions were made. The first is the methods of execution authorized in this country are not administered "painlessly," and in accordance to the Eighth Amendment. The second is there is n~ evidence to support the claim that the death penalty has a deterrent effect. The third is innocent people have been sentenced to death. The fourth is the death penalty is being applied based on legally improper criteria (race, gender, and socioeconomic class). The fifth is from a strictly financial perspective the death penalty is unreasonable. Lastly is that maintaining our moral leadership as well as the death penalty cannot be done in the eyes of the international community, and the death penalty is on the decline. This study expands upon existing literature regarding the aforementioned six key areas of interests, through the use of a non-experimental, descriptive research survey. Results suggest that although an overwhelming majority of subjects are not knowledgeable about the death penalty, 45 percent still support the death penalty. Education may be the key to bringing a decline in support for the death penalty; those who have taken a class on the death penalty, or are currently taking one support the death penalty 17.4-19.9 percent (respectively) less than those who have never taken a class on the death penalty. In conclusion, support for the death penalty may be related to a lack of knowledge.

When the United States Supreme Court approved the reinstatement of the death penalty in the United States in 1976, it did so based on the promise of new safeguards against comparative excessiveness and relative disproportionality resulting from jury sentencing in capital cases. As Justice Stevens noted in 2008, one of these safeguards – meaningful appellate review of death sentences – is, in practice, non-existent. This thesis examines the use of this purported safeguard by the Ohio Supreme Court, in the form of comparative proportionality review, to determine the degree to which Ohio capital cases are ‘relatively proportionate’ in the time period after the state adopted life without parole as a sentencing option in 1996. Specifically, this thesis employs two approaches to identifying ‘similar’ cases – the overall aggravation approach (through logistic regression analysis) and the fact specific approach – and then compares each death sentence to its group of ‘similar’ cases to determine whether it is relatively proportionate, given the death sentencing ratio of its comparable group. After establishing that at least forty per cent of Ohio cases were relatively disproportionate, the thesis argues that Ohio’s current approach violates the requirements of the Eighth Amendment. In particular, the Court’s failure to examine cases sentenced to life as part of its proportionality review and its use of the precedent-seeking approach has the outcome of ignoring death sentences that are comparatively excessive. Finally, the thesis concludes by offering a normative model by which Ohio can improve its administration of comparative proportionality review. The thesis advocates the use of a ‘purposive’ approach, defining ‘similarity’ on the basis of the intended purpose of punishment, and suggesting that just deserts retribution provides the best approach for determining ‘similarity’.