9/22/11

Opposing the death penalty, under any circumstance

"From this day forward, I no longer shall tinker with the machinery of death. For more than 20 years I have endeavored...to develop...rules that would lend more than the mere appearance of fairness to the death penalty endeavor...Rather than continue to coddle the court's delusion that the desired level of fairness has been achieved...I feel...obligated simply to concede that the death penalty experiment has failed. It is virtually self-evident to me now that no combination of procedural rules or substantive regulations ever can save the death penalty from its inherent constitutional deficiencies..." 
- Justice Harry A. Blackmun, dissent in Callins v. Collins (Feb 1994)
(thanks to LP for the quote)


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