Chapter 5 Outline

Social solidarity: Durkheim’s concept that refers to the common moral ground shared by individuals which binds them together in our social institutions

Lawmakers, prosecutors, judges, governors and courts are all influenced by public opinion in the continued use of the death penalty in the U.S.

Attitudinal Model: A model with two assumptions: judges' decisions are the result of their individual attitudes/ideologies and those attitudes are fundamental and long-lasting
Political Adjustment Hypothesis: A model which posits that justices are likely to be strategic when deciding cases that are strongly linked to public views and are willing to step outside of their individual belief systems in order for the Court to maintain a positive public image

Jury nullification is a practice that serves as an indirect expression of public disdain for the death penalty
The Enlightenment Period/Age of Reason turned away from the rule of the church and began to look to science for answers
Cesare Becarria believed the death penalty was excessive and that other punishments would work to protect the public from offenders
Anti-gallows movement was facilitated by religious leaders, social reformers, legislators, and the general public. Organizers focused on spreading the word about the atrocities of executions, particularly hangings, via newspapers and by other means of public communication
Gallup poll: The most prominent and widely accepted public opinion poll produced by the American Institute of Public Opinion
President Johnson’s administration was the first to ask Congress to abolish the death penalty
Gallup poll results indicate that found the greatest public support for the death penalty was in the 1980s and 1990s
1994 marked the highest level of support for the death penalty at 80%
There is a correlation between the crime rate going up and support for the death penalty going up; the decline in the crime rate shows a decline in support for the death penalty

S. Supreme Court Justice, Thurgood Marshall, hypothesized that if the public were adequately and properly informed about the death penalty, they would not support it
His second hypothesis was that if a person’s underlying belief in the death penalty is retributive in nature, then proper education would do little to change his/her position
Studies by Sarat & Vidmar and Vidmar & Dittenhoffer suggest that Marshall’s hypotheses may have merit

There’s a global trend to abolish the death penalty
As of 2010, two-thirds of the countries have abolished the death penalty (96 countries)
The five countries leading in the number of executions are: China, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Iraq, and the United States
The U.S. is the only western developed country to still have the death penalty