NCJ Number
81191
Journal
Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology Volume: 72 Issue: 4 Dated: (Winter 1981) Pages: 1667-1698
Date Published
1981
Length
32 pages
Annotation
This article contrasts the different modes of thought of criminologists and socologists with those of the Federal judiciary as demonstrated by the 1977 Supreme Court decision in Coker v. Georgia which struck down the death penalty for rape of an adult woman but ignored the issue of racial discrimination in capital rape sentencing.
Abstract
Coker was the last of a series of cases beginning with Maxwell v. Stephens in which the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People's Legal Defense Fund (LDF) pressed the argument that capital rape sentencing was racially discriminatory. However, with one exception the Coker justices never mentioned the issue of racial discrimination in their opinions but cited violations of the 8th and 14th amendments. This was particularly surprising to social scientists since a conclusive study on rape cases in southern and border States between 1945 and 1960 had discovered that blacks who raped whites received the death penalty in 36 percent of the cases, while the comparable percentage for blacks who raped blacks or whites who raped whites was only 2 percent. Although the Court was aware of this research, several reasons may be advanced for their not legitimating its findings. Because judges have deficient backgrounds in social sciences and statistics, they may disregard such studies and rest their decisions on other bases. Judges may also be wary about using information that by the nature of sociological inquiry is subjected to new modes of proof and often invalidated by subsequent research. The suspicions that judges already have toward the introduction of evidence from the social sciences is frequently exacerbated by the legal gaffes of criminologists and sociologists serving as witnesses. Several cases involving capital punishment are described to show that the Court often follows the 'passive virtues' doctrine by refusing to confront new issues when cases could be decided satisfactorily without them. When almost all the justices in Coker found that possible patterns of racial discrimination before the Furman and Gregg decisions, which invalidated many State capital punishment statutes, were irrelevant, social studies on discrimination became obsolete. Other possible explanations for the Court's actions include fear of opening a Pandora's Box of charges against the judicial system, skepticism of a study which had been financed by the LDF, and the Burger Court's cool attitude toward reform. Finally, the article discusses whether social studies on discrimination have outlived their usefulness as evidence in death penalty litigation and suggests ways in which social scientists and judges might improve communication between their respective worlds. The paper includes 110 footnotes.