Imprisoned by the Past: Warren McCleskey and the American Death Penalty connects the history of the American death penalty to the case of Warren McCleskey. By highlighting the relation between American history and an individual case, Imprisoned by the Past provides a unique understanding of the big picture of capital punishment in the context of a compelling human story. McCleskey's criminal law case resulted in one of the most important Supreme Court cases in U.S. legal history, where the Court confronted evidence of racial discrimination in the administration of capital punishment. The case marks the last that the Supreme Court realistically might have held that capital punishment violates the Eighth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution. As such, the constitutional law case also created a turning point in the death penalty debate in the country. The book connects McCleskey's case -- as well as his life and crime -- to the issues that have haunted the American death penalty debate since the first executions by early settlers and that still affect the legal system today. Imprisoned by the Past ties together three unique American stories in U.S history. First, the book considers the changing American death penalty across centuries where drastic changes have occurred in the last fifty years. Second, the book discusses the role that race played in that history. And third, the book tells the story of Warren McCleskey and how his life and legal case brought together the other two narratives.

Autorentext

Jeffrey L. Kirchmeier is a Professor of Law at City University of New York School of Law. He received his B.A. and J.D. degrees from Case Western Reserve University. Before joining the CUNY Law faculty, he was an Associate at Arnold & Porter in Washington, D.C., and he taught at Tulane School of Law and Arizona State University College of Law. For several years, he was a staff attorney at the Arizona Capital Representation Project. Prof. Kirchmeier is a member and former Chair of the Capital Punishment Committee of the New York City Bar Association, and has appeared before a New York Assembly joint committee regarding the reinstatement of the New York death penalty. He is the author of numerous law review articles on the subject of criminal procedure, constitutional law, and the death penalty.

Zusammenfassung
Imprisoned by the Past: Warren McCleskey and the American Death Penalty connects the history of the American death penalty to the case of Warren McCleskey. By highlighting the relation between American history and an individual case, Imprisoned by the Past provides a unique understanding of the big picture of capital punishment in the context of a compelling human story. McCleskey's criminal law case resulted in one of the most important Supreme Court cases in U.S. legal history, where the Court confronted evidence of racial discrimination in the administration of capital punishment. The case marks the last that the Supreme Court realistically might have held that capital punishment violates the Eighth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution. As such, the constitutional law case also created a turning point in the death penalty debate in the country. The book connects McCleskey's case -- as well as his life and crime -- to the issues that have haunted the American death penalty debate since the first executions by early settlers and that still affect the legal system today. Imprisoned by the Past ties together three unique American stories in U.S history. First, the book considers the changing American death penalty across centuries where drastic changes have occurred in the last fifty years. Second, the book discusses the role that race played in that history. And third, the book tells the story of Warren McCleskey and how his life and legal case brought together the other two narratives.

Inhalt

Preface Introduction Part A - Prologue Prologue: America's Marietta Part B - A Killing in Georgia Chapter 1: A Death in Dixie Chapter 2: The Trial of Warren McCleskey Chapter 3: Offie Evans and McCleskey v. Zant Part C - American Death Penalty History And the Courts Chapter 4: The First Limits: The Early American Death Penalty through the 1850s Chapter 5: Wars and Death Penalty Abolition: The Civil War Through Early 1900s Chapter 6: A Time of Change: American Society and the Death Penalty 1950s through the 1960s Chapter 7: Into the Courthouse: The 1970s Abolition Strategy Chapter 8: A New Era: A New U.S. Death Penalty Returns in the Late 1970s Chapter 9: Starting Over: Executions Resume in the 1970s and 1980s Part D - Lynching, Race, and McCleskey v. Kemp Chapter 10: Lynching and Race in America Chapter 11: Race and the Courts Chapter 12: Warren McCleskey and the Baldus Study Chapter 13: The Supreme Court and McCleskey v Kemp Part E - Execution Chapter 14: Mitigation and Reform Chapter 15: Warren McCleskey & the Electric Chair Chapter 16: Other American Execution Methods Part F - The Capital Punishment Debate Moves Outside the Courts after McCleskey Chapter 17: The Unstoppable Death Penalty After McCleskey into the early 1990s Chapter 18: New Abolitionist Voices in the 1990s Chapter 19: Innocence and the American Death Penalty Chapter 20: A Moratorium Movement Emerges in the 1990s Part G - McCleskey's Legacy in the Early Twenty-First Century Chapter 21: The Early Twenty-First Century Death Penalty in the Courts Chapter 22: The Early Twenty-First Century Death Penalty in U.S. Politics Chapter 23: Escaping from Imprisonment of the Past Part H - Epilogue Epilogue: Warren McCleskey's Case and the American Death Penalty Today