NEWS: Lethal Injection and Voter IDs and Protests, Oh My!

POLITICS: Lethal Injection and Voter IDs and Protests, Oh My!

It was a big week for the United States Supreme Court - the Justices not only heard oral arguments in potentially landmark cases challenging the constitutionality of lethal injection and mandatory voter identification, but the Court building also served as the site of a massive demonstration calling for a shutdown of Guantanamo Bay.



The Court returned from a winter break on Monday and began the year by hearing Baze v. Rees, a case brought by two inmates on death row in Kentucky. They contend that the three-drug combination used in executions in all but one of the 36 states that still have the death penalty constitutes cruel and unusual punishment, which is prohibited by the Eighth Amendment.



In 1977, when death by electric chair was the norm, the chief medical examiner in Oklahoma developed the drug cocktail in an attempt to make executions more "humane." It consists of a barbiturate to make the individual unconscious, pancuronium bromide to paralyze muscles and stop breathing, and potassium chloride to stop the heart. Essentially, this thirty-year-old dosage combination suffocates people to death, only the drug that is supposed to make the condemned unconscious often doesn't work. So they are conscious of the suffocation as it comes on, but unable to move or speak to communicate about it.

Opponents of the death penalty were hopeful when the Court agreed to hear the case challenging this method last fall - they essentially halted all executions in the country by granting stays to any prisoner that appealed to them. Some saw this is a hint that perhaps they would strike down this method and, for all intents and purposes, stop the death penalty for the foreseeable future. But a lot of those hopes were dashed by the reactions of the Justices during oral argument.

Justices Scalia and Roberts expressed expected opposition, but the usually liberal Justice Breyer was unexpectedly skeptical, expressing doubt that any other method of execution would be any less painful or less prone to human error. And even Justice Stevens, the Court's most liberal Justice, conceded that the state should probably win if the issue was how well it administered the current protocol, leaving open the question about whether the constitutionality of the method itself was really being examined at all.



You can read the entire transcript of the arguments here, or download them and hear them for yourself here.



The Justices also expressed skepticism at a challenge to an Indiana law requiring all voters present valid, government-issued IDs at the polls in order to cast a vote. The challengers - the ACLU and the Indiana Democratic Party - contend that the ID requirement is an undue burden on the right to vote because the justification of voter fraud is not enough of a problem to need such a drastic solution. They claim that it will disproportionately affect poor and minority voters (who usually vote for the Democratic Party) who are less likely than more affluent white voters to have drivers' licenses and passports.

The Justices seemed dismissive not only of this argument, but of the entire case in general. Courts are only supposed to hear cases brought by parties who are actually harmed, but this suit was brought before the law could ever be implemented. So, technically, no one has ever been harmed by it. The issue is a deeply partisan one, of course, but the Justices apparently managed to ignore this fact.

And finally, the week rounded out with a massive protest, both inside and outside the Court, against the torture of prisoners held at Guantanamo Bay. Police arrested 80 people without incident.

Ironically, the protest overshadowed the fact that the Court ruled on that very day that the Guantanamo detainees could not sue Pentagon officers and military officials for torturing them.

One wonders if the most enduringly damaging part of the Bush legacy will be the war or his Supreme Court nominees.

And it seems to me that it isn't. With arguments like this...

... how could it be? It seems to be a superficial question that doesn't lead to any substantial examination of the issue. I mean, why not boil them in oil - if that's the case?

Well for one thing with oil being over $100 a barrel it's not cost effective.

You know what's cruel? Murder. Though I am against the death penalty I hate the chair not because of cruelty reasons, it's not cruel enough. If a guy rapes and murders three women, he gets off easily if he only has to get shot with drugs.

Wait - you're against the death penalty but think that it isn't cruel enough? I apologize, I just don't quite understand what you are saying.

I think he hates the death penalty as it operates now because it's not revenge-y enough.

I think.

I'm surprised someone hasn't suggesting bringing back the guillotine (spelling?). It was supposed to be a painless method of execution.

I can't really decide where I stand on the whole death penalty issue. Part of me thinks it should be left up to the family of the victim(s).

I'm a bit ashamed of my state. We're the only ones left with the electric chair.

Great article MissTyrios , & welcome back to where you belong .

I'm painfully familiar with the voter ID issue. Another great example of Hoosier thinking.

So far as I have seen, there hasn't been a single proven case of voter fraud pertaining to ID. But that doesn't seem to matter.

My take is that this is directed at minimizing the number of poor people who vote.

The Supreme Court appointments, hands down. The republican power base knew that's what they were fighting for in 2000, the Democrats did not. It will take over 30 years to undo the damage that has been done by this supreme court. And that 30 years time line starts with the next appointment that replaces one of the conservative judges.

Well written my friend. Good to have you back doing this!

You know what's funny? I suggested to my mom, when we were discussing the death penalty, that the guillotine should be the preferred method if we are going to have it.

/against the death penalty
//for the most part.
///too many innocent people have been sent to death row.

I'm against it too, until I read about some serial rapist or something.

Very much agreed! In a 3 branch system that is supposed to be about checks and balances it is amazing the amount damage a single party can do the the state of our government and lives.

Bring back Madame Guillotine!

I really don't need to get into another death penalty discussion on these boards. But I am a glutton for punishment, sooo....

What was your source for the "often" part of that sentence? I have read accounts that it has happened, but I didn't hear how often in any of them. Mainly because there is no standard to judge, since apparently part of the "cocktail" gets quickly absorbed into fat and muscle tissue even after death. I suppose you could make the argument that even one failure is one too many. But that's not an argument I personally would make.

That said, everything I have read indicates that if we are going to continue with death by lethal injection a) the cocktail should be altered to a modern standard of care b) medical professionals should be present IN THE ROOM at the time of injection.

I see no point in making sure that the guilty party is "comfortable" in their last minutes. I don't think that the had comfort of their victims in mind when they commited whatever act that landed them a death sentance. Personally, I think we should go back to drawing and quartering. Or mayhaps public eviceration. If you knew that if you caused harm enought to people that, if caught, you would be subject to the most painful form of execution that can be conjured up, would you not be more reluctant to commit the crime in the first place?

On to the argument of mistaken execution... A curosy seach that I just performed found about two hundred cases of wrongful conviction and subsequent release. When was the last time we actually carried out a sentance on an innocent? Perhaps my fool-hardy conservatism leads me to believe that since the advances in modern technology and forensic sciences, that the margin of error has dropped dramatically as of recent years. (the last overturned conviction I could find was a case from 1987, the accused was released in 1993) If anyone has links of something more recent, please post links. That being said, the number one issue, when polled, for people opposing the dealth penalty was mistaken execution. What mistakes have been made as of late?

212 innocent people have had their convictions overturned so far.

Here's the list.

17 of those were in 2007 alone, so the trend is accelerating. One of those convictions was as recent as 2005.

A cursory look into the above mentioned cases reveals that the majority of these cases were lengthy prison terms or life prison terms. Of the two that I found in my cursory search, one had already been reduced to a life sentance before acquittal, and the other was a case from 1972 that was overturned in 1994 by DNA evidence. This argument was about death sentances, not life sentances. And even of the death sentances overturned, this still shows no cases of actuall execution of an innocent man or woman. Usually, when there is even a magin of doubt, a death sentance is not handed down, for the sake of the accused. I maintain my original position.

The problem with your argument is that fairly few people will spend scant resources doing testing for someone already excecuted, preferring spend those scant resources to exonerate and free those who are still alive and/or have spent years if not decades behind bars unjustly.

Also, here's a later example, executed in 1996:

Not totally clear cut, but a good case can be made that he wouldn't have gotten the death penalty had the DNA evidence not been surpressed by the prosecution.

The reason that we aren't using the guillotine now is this same debate.

Source

It may be a myth, as has been suggested several times, but I post this since it seems a more scholarly rebuttal and therefore more credible.

This isn't an opinion one way or the other, just a thought in terms of the constitutionality of the guillotine as a method.