Torture In The 8th Amendment

The Eighth Amendment of the United States Constitution protects us to not be putted into cruel and unusual punishments, but when it comes to the death penalty, things become more complicated. In my personal opinion, I believe the absolute interpretation of the 8th Amendment and that the death penalty undoubtedly violates the 8th Amendment. Looking at the case of “Furman v. Georgia (1972)”, the Court invalidated death penalty laws in the end because the justices considered the punishment of the death penalty was too cruel and unusual to the Furman’ sin, accidentally killing people, and disproportionately using the death penalty would result in more serious problems to the poor and minorities. This decision fully reflected the reliability of

Capital Punishment is Not Only Unusual, But Cruel      The most widely known aspect of the eighth amendment is the fact that it prohibits cruel and unusual punishment. Cruel and unusual punishment is perceived as punishment that causes “an unnecessary and wanton infliction of pain” (Bailey). Is capital punishment cruel and unusual? It is one of the most controversial topics in America today. In effect since the 1600s, the US Supreme Court ruled that the death penalty was “cruel and unusual” in 1972 but reversed this decision when a "cleaner" way to bring about death was found in 1976 (Encarta).

Hannah Patrick, one has only to look at some of the cases such as Coker v. Georgia to feel that the death penalty does not violate the Eight Amendment’s ban on cruel and unusual punishment. However, the U.S. Supreme Court says it is excessive punishment for the rape of an adult woman and that it violates the Eighth Amendment prohibition of cruel and unusual punishment. In Coker v. Georgia, the defendant raped a woman and stabbed her to death. Eight months later he kidnapped another woman, raped her twice, and abandoned her to die after biting her severely. While he was serving multiple life terms in prison, he escaped and kidnapped, raped, and robbed a third woman at knifepoint (LeSage, 1978). I do not see how you can read about this case and decide as the U.S. Supreme Court did.

The famous Founding Fathers of the United States created critical documents to protect the citizens of the country they were establishing. These documents included the Declaration of Independence and Bill of Rights. The latter, the Bill of Rights, ensures certain rights to all citizens, and the Eighth Amendment in particular, protects citizens against cruel or unusual punishments for breaking the law. When analyzing the protection under the Eighth Amendment one must also look at all the aspects of the law including: the history of the law, the modern uses and abuses of the law, and the law’s current effectiveness.

Solitary confinement has had a long history in the American prison system. America is the first country to adapt solitary confinement into the prison regiment. Pennsylvania had the first special housing units for inmates or “SHU”. When Europeans came to America to look at the new model for prisons in Pennsylvania they wrote reports describing to the European parliament on how prisoners were treated like caged animals. Many of them quickly realized that this was not what prisons were set out to accomplish. The purpose of a prison is to rehabilitate criminals and bring them back into society as an individual that has the best mental tools and skills to make their respective communities better. Putting inmates in solitary confinement for more than 48 hours can only lead to awful emotional pain and mental problems which can result in self-destructive behavior to regain the self-control that is being deprived through this process of isolation and expulsion.

The Eighth Amendment was tested through many Supreme Court and there were some very significant ones such as the Miller v. Alabama. The no cruel or unusual aspect of the Eighth Amendment gives protection of undeserving or unreasonable punishment to a citizen that commits a crime. As Supreme Court cases regarding the Eighth Amendment open and closed the meaning of no cruel or unusual punishment changed; the sentencing of death is not considered cruel and/or unusual to a suspect that is mentally insane this aspect of the Eighth Amendment is important to the wrongfully accused people that are sentenced something for a crime that they did not commit. A significant

The Eighth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution limits the punishments that may be imposed by the government on American citizens. These limits are compulsory among the states by way of the Fourteenth Amendment. The English Bill of Rights of 1689 expressed concern with arbitrary and disproportionate sanctions, giving way to the Founders inclusion of the prohibition against cruel and unusual punishment. To explore the Eighth Amendment it is important to consider constitutionally accepted punishments, the ever-evolving practice of capital punishment, and eighth amendment protection inside prison walls.

In my opinion, the 8th amendment is important because this amendment gives people the right against excessive bail, fines, or cruel and unusual punishment. No citizen of the United States should be subjected to cruel or insane punishment, and they shouldn 't have to pay a bail amount that is too excessive for the crime. This Amendment was added to the Bill of Rights to ensure greater stability and was a compromise between the legislature election in the original non-party elections and the new president. The Amendment’s Bail Clause is a result of injustices perpetrated in England, were judges often abused their power in determining whether bail should be allowed to suspects. After a number of unsuccessful attempts at reforming the law, the English Bill of Rights in 1689 specifically outlawed excessive bail. The U.S. supreme court 's held in 1987 that the eighth Amendment 's Bail Clause had only one meaning that bail conditions, when compared with the magnitude of

The Bill of Rights makes the country what it is today. A diverse, free country with limitations to protect us. The Bill of Rights was written by James Madison in 1789. It contains the United States first ten amendments. It was then ratified on December 15, 1791. Although the amendments are ordered, they are all equally important, however some can be argued as outdated. The 8th Amendment states, “ Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted.” This amendment is very important today. It is much different from different countries, and some think it’s unfair. However, because of the opinionated way of setting bail, it only makes sense to have a law that limits that. The 8th amendment is very significant in our country today because it protects citizens from excessive bail, fines, and unjust and cruel punishments.

According to “Solitary Confinement: Common Misconceptions and Emerging Safe Alternatives” by Alison Shames, Jessa Wilcox, and Ram Subramanian on the Vera Institute of Justice, solitary confinement is often sentenced to “fulfill a prison’s or jail’s top priority: the safety of its staff and the incarcerated people under their care.” (Shames, Wilcox, & Subramanian, 2015). However, most inmates that are placed in solitary confinement are

In the Bill of rights it talks about the 1st amendment. The 1st amendment says “...or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press…” which means that we have the right to say what we want and we don’t have to talk to the press. This impacts our lives today by not being limited on what we can or can't say. The 3rd amendment says that no soldier can come into our homes without our approval. This impacts U.S. today by giving us more freedom and privacy. In the 8th amendment it talks about how “ Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted”. What that is saying is high amounts of bail aren’t aloud, if it's over a certain amount you can’t

According to the Merriam-Webster dictionary, Solitary Confinement is the confinement of a prisoner in a cell or other place which he or she is completely isolated from any and everyone. Merriam Webster also states that even some prisoners are held from 22.5 to 24 hours a day. Solitary confinement is sometimes referred to as isolation, segregation, separation, and cellular confinements so that it seems different from solitary confinement or too make it sound like a less harsh punishment. Solitary Confinement is a huge controversy in today’s society, although some might of forgot due to the fact that there’s an orange oompa loompa celebrity as our president, but this has been a problem since it was introduced in 1829. “In 1829, the first experiment in solitary confinement was at the Eastern State Penitentiary in Philadelphia. It was based on a Quaker belief that prisoners isolated in stone cells with only a Bible would use the time to repent, pray and find introspection.”(Timeline on NPR.org) A large population of people believe that solitary confinement is a violation against anyone 's human rights. On the other side of this argument, some people believe it is a necessary form of punishment and that it does not violate anyone’s human or constitutional rights. In my personal opinion, Solitary confinement violates both the 8th Amendment of the United States Constitution and Article five of the Declaration of Human Rights. I don’t understand how isolating someone for that

The definition of cruel or unusual punishment is something still being argued today. Once a convict enters the prison system, they are stripped of some of their constitutional rights but one is sure to remain- no cruel or unusual punishment (At Issue: Treatment of Prisoners). Cruel and unusual punishment was never thoroughly defined. Anyone can interpret it the way they please. It is said that those who are mentally ill get much less punishment then those who are not. However, no one ever said what happens if you go insane inside of solitary confinement. In the current day prison system, if one goes insane while inside the system, you

Since the introduction of solitary confinement and the construction of super-max prison there has an on going debate on whether using these punishment is violating the 8th amendment and also explaining all the health risk caused by solitary confinement. Solitary confinement is when a prisoner is held in a cell alone and they spend between 22.5 and 24 hours a day. Prisoners have no contact with other inmates and guards are also have limited contact with inmates. Solitary confinement was first introduced in the mid-nineteenth century and it was believed that it would help reform prisoners. The ideology behind solitary confinement and super-max prisons was that prisoners would be locked up alone and left with nothing but their Bible and this would allow the prisoner to reflect on his actions and wrong doings and eventually reform into a law-abiding citizen. But soon after solitary confinement was put into place it became clear that solitary confinement did not meet there goal of reforming individuals but evidence proved it caused harmed to the prisoners physical and mental health. Besides being harmful to prisoner’s physical and mental health it was also very expensive to run super-max prisons. Many began to question whether it was morally and ethically correct to keep prisoners in solitary confinement for long periods of time at once. When solitary confinement was first introduced it was used as a short-term punishment for prisoner who committed severe offenses in prison.

Solitary confinement is a form of punishment that isolates an inmate to a small cell with heavily restricted human interaction. This method of discipline dates back to 1787, the same year the United States Constitution was drafted (Katel). However, over the years, solitary confinement has morphed into super maximum-security prisons across the nation that are built solely for the use of this punishment. Since 1842 people have disagreed with this tactic, but with the recent growth of “supermax” prisons the debate has become relevant once again (Katel). The issue is: people are being abused in prison, whether the guards are the ones being attacked by unruly prisoners, or inmates are facing maltreatment from other inmates. This violence needs to decrease greatly and the best way to do that is reform the system. As a result of this violence, solitary confinement has been utilized to punish inmates instead of attempting to solve the underlying issues that caused the offenses in the first place. Solitary confinement is a form of imprisonment that has gone from a useful method of separating dangerous inmates from the general population to a form of torture, thus restrictions needs to be put into place in order to increase rehabilitation from incarceration into society.