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Politics : PRESIDENT GEORGE W. BUSH -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Frederick Smart who wrote (265587)	6/20/2002 1:37:49 PM
From: Skywatcher	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 769667

How progressive.....Guess W didn't get a Texas say in this one...could a hurt his overall numbers as governor .Supreme Court Bars Execution of the Mentally Retarded By: Scott Ritter, Of Dow Jones Newswires WASHINGTON -- Executing mentally retarded people for capital crimes is cruel and unusual punishment prohibited by the Constitution, the Supreme Court declared Thursday. Ruling 6-3 in a case from Virginia , the high court said such executions violate the nation's "evolving standards of decency." Eighteen states now prohibit execution of the mentally retarded, up from just two when the justices upheld the punishment in 1989. Back then, there was "insufficient evidence of a national consensus" against such executions to conclude they violated the Eighth Amendment's ban on cruel and unusual punishment, Justice Sandra Day O'Connor wrote at the time. That has since changed, said Justice John Paul Stevens. "Construing and applying the Eighth Amendment in the light of our 'evolving standards of decency,' we therefore conclude that such punishment is excessive and that the Constitution 'places a substantive restriction on the state's power to take the life' of a mentally retarded offender," Justice Stevens said. Before Thursday's ruling, mentally retarded people could face execution in 20 of the 38 death penalty states. Twelve states don't have the death penalty at all. When those are added to the 18 that have rejected the death penalty for the retarded, a majority of states are against such executions. CC