William Furman, a twenty-six-year-old mentally deficient black man, was convicted of the murder of a white householder. Lucious Jackson, a twenty-one-year-old black man of average intelligence was convicted of raping a white woman. Georgia’s state Supreme Court upheld both convictions and death sentences. A third case involved Elmer Branch, a borderline, mentally deficient black man who entered the home of a sixty-five-year-old white woman and raped her. The Texas Court of Appeals upheld the conviction and the sentence of death. The U. S. Supreme Court ruled on Furman as the lead case and overturned the three convictions, by the lower courts.
These three cases came to the attention of the U.S. Supreme Court, just four months after the case of People v. Anderson in which the California Supreme Court, by a six to one decision held that ‘the infliction of capital punishment, per se, constitutes cruel and unusual punishment.‘ This decision by the U. S. Supreme Court came to be known as the Furman decision. In short, the Court announced, ‘the imposition and carrying out of the death penalty . . . constitutes cruel and unusual punishment in violation of the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments.‘ (Berkson,’75)
The Furman decision could well have signaled the end of capital executions in this country. But the political playing field was not yet ready for such new ground to be broken. The decision set a precedent for conviction and sentencing in capital crimes. While it abolished the infliction of the death penalty, the decision left open an acceptability of the continued practice of capital punishment, if it were fairly applied.
The phrase ‘if fairly applied‘ would have meant mandatory death for all who were convicted of capital crimes or limitations to discretionary judgment by a prosecutor to seek the death penalty, over a plea bargain to a lesser crime; by a jury to find the accused guilty of the capital crime, rather than a lesser crime, for which the sentence might be life imprisonment, and by the judge who instructs the jury in what their findings could be.
All nine justices wrote separate opinions in the decision representing a variety of rationale on both sides. The one consistent idea that ran throughout the majority’s opinion wasthe death penalty had been applied in an arbitrary manner and thus constitutes cruel and unusual punishment. The opinion of the minority was equally consistent. They agreed that judicial self-restraint should be exercised in the present case and that the ultimate determination should be made by the legislature.
It was necessary for Justice Marshall, in making his decision to construct four standards against which the death penalty should be measured. A penalty may be considered cruel and unusual for any one of the following reasons: (1) if it involves so much pain and suffering that civilized people cannot tolerate it; (2) if it was previously unknown for a given offense; (3) if it was excessive and served no legislative purpose; and (4) if it is abhorred by popular sentiment. (Derkson)