Amendment, Eighth

Amendment to the US Constitution stating that people convicted of crimes should not be subject to excessive bail or fines, and that authorities may not inflict ‘cruel and unusual punishments’. This amendment has been cited as an argument against capital punishment. Part of the Bill of Rights, it was ratified in 1791.

In the 1972 US Supreme Court case Furman v. Georgia three men sentenced to death argued that the death penalty violated their Eighth Amendment protection against cruel and unusual punishment. The Court ruled that the death penalty was cruel and unusual in this instance because it was not applied fairly and objectively. The decision affected 600 people already on death row, and several states adopted new laws to prevent arbitrary use of the death penalty.