Cruel And Unusual Punishment Quotes

• Back in pre-Revolutionary America cruel and unusual punishment meant the rack and burning at the stake... in more recent rulings it has been taken to mean the absence of cable television and denial of sex-change operations, or just overcrowding in the prisons.

  Tom Clancy

  Sex, Taken, Mean

  "Executive Orders". Book by Tom Clancy, p. 613, 1996.

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• We either believe in the dignity of the individual, the rule of law, and the prohibition of cruel and unusual punishment, or we don't. There is no middle ground.

  Leon Panetta

  Believe, Law, Punishment

  "Obama's CIA Pick Has Confirmation Hearings". Interview with Robert Siegel, www.npr.org. February 5, 2009.

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• By requiring that an execution be relatively painless, we necessarily protect the inmate from enduring any punishment that is comparable to the suffering inflicted on his victim. This trend, while appropriate and required by the Eighth Amendment's prohibition on cruel and unusual punishment, actually undermines the very premise on which public approval of the retribution rationale is based.

  John Paul Stevens

  Punishment, Suffering, Trends

  Baze v. Rees, 553 U.S. 35, www.law.cornell.edu. 2008.

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• With respect to the death penalty, I believe that a majority of the Supreme Court will one day accept that when the state punishes with death, it denies the humanity and dignity of the victim and transgresses the prohibition against cruel and unusual punishment. That day will be a great day for our country, for it will be a great day for our Constitution.

  William J. Brennan

  Country, Believe, Punishment

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• By creating false environment of a war on drugs, and cruel and unusual punishment with these crimes, 50% of our U.S. population is in jail without having hurt anybody, mostly for drugs.

  Oliver Stone

  Hurt, War, Punishment

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• The government considers the aborting of innocent unborn children a natural right. Yet, there is widespread debate still about whether the death penalty for convicted murderers is "cruel and unusual punishment."

  Joseph Farah

  Children, Punishment, Government

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• Today the Internal Revenue Code constitutes cruel and unusual punishment. A flat tax would be an enormous step forward.

  Arlen Specter

  Punishment, Would Be, Today

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• The Eighth Amendment to the Constitution protects citizens against cruel and unusual punishment. And there is a growing body of legal precedent that shows that transgender people who are incarcerated should be provided with these medically necessary procedures. In cases where they're not, it is considered a violation of those rights.

  Allyson Robinson

  Rights, Punishment, People

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• The Constitution has to be interpreted loosely, otherwise it becomes a straitjacket. You can't interpret it literally. You can pretend to, and go digging around in 18th Century dictionaries to figure out what 'cruel and unusual punishment' meant or what the 'right to bear arms' meant, but that is all fake really. The Constitution has to be interpreted in light of modern needs, and that's what they (the strict interpreters) end up doing in spite of all their investigations.

  Richard Posner

  Light, Punishment, Fake

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• In Western Europe and North America some things are better than they were - at least relative to their moral nadirs - such as labour legislation, the opening of the professions to women, intolerance for domestic violence, but so much is still morally unacceptable - the weapons trade, cruel and unusual punishment, economic parasitism.

  Catherine Wilson

  Europe, Punishment, America

  Source: www.3ammagazine.com

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• I’d forgotten to keep blasting a song in my mind. I remedied my mistake, but the lyrics to “Do You Really Want to Hurt Me” seemed too close to home at the mo-ment. “Culture Club?” Now his mouth curled downward. “And you accuse me of practicing cruel and unusual punishment.

  Jeaniene Frost

  Song, Hurt, Mistake

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