... on capital punishment nationwide. From 1930 until 1967, 3859 people were executed in the US, 3334 for murder (www. uaa). That's an average of almost 105 people per year, three out of five of which were executed in the South. By 1967, all but ten states had laws for capital punishment. Nationally, strong pressure was steadily placed on the federal government by those opposed to capital punishment which resulted in an unofficial moratorium on executions until 1976. Officially, the Supreme Court ruled capital punishment unconstitutional in 1972. In Furman v. Georgia,408 U.S. 238 (1972), a 5-4 Supreme Court decision ruled that CP laws in their present form were "arbitrary and capricious" and constituted cruel and unusual punishment in violation of the Eighth Amendment as well as due process of the Fourteenth Amendment (www.aclu). In its decision, the Court voted that the death penalty statutes were vague and ambiguous, providing little ...

See this essay or coursework document in full right now