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"Many citizens consider it insensitive and unseemly, if not immoral, for a country, with our historical record on slavery and race discrimination, to persist in using a punishment that is administered and controlled almost exclusively by whites and serves no demonstrated function, but has a profound adverse impact, physically, psychologically, and symbolically on its black citizens." - David Baldus and George Woodward, experts on race and the US death penalty
The USA has a long history of racism, not only by individuals, but often enshrined in law. In 1776, the original Constitution explicitly legitimized the institution of slavery in three of its provisions, counting a slave as three-fifths of a person for the purpose of apportioning seats in the House of Representatives.
Particularly in the slave holding states, this attitude permeated the administration of justice. For example, prior to the American Civil War, the law in Georgia prescribed different punishments for certain crimes based on the race of the defendant or victim. The rape of a white woman by a black man was a capital offence, while the same crime committed by a white man carried a sentence of between two and 20 years imprisonment. The rape of a black woman was punishable only by fine or imprisonment, at the discretion of the court.
Other laws were simply applied selectively against blacks. Rape was once punishable by death in Virginia; between 1908 and 1972, only blacks were executed under this statute, even though 45 per cent of those convicted of rape were white. The one white man sentenced to death for rape during this period had his sentence commuted by the governor. In 1950, lawyers representing seven black men appealed their rape convictions on the grounds that only blacks were executed for the crime. The Virginia Supreme Court denied the appeal, stating there was "not a scintilla of evidence" of racial prejudice. All seven were executed.
In the early part of this century, the death penalty in some regions became closely related to the common practice of lynching. A form of extrajudicial execution, lynching was predominately carried out against blacks in the southern states (where the majority of current executions take place). Between 1880 and 1930, 3,220 blacks were lynched compared to 723 whites. As the practice became socially unacceptable, public demand for the swift execution of alleged criminals was satisfied instead by the guarantee of judicial death sentences.
For example, a man was hanged immediately after an hour-long trial in Mayfield, Kentucky, in 1906. An editorial in the local newspaper, The Louisville Courier-Journal, observed that: "The fact, however, that Kentucky was saved the mortification of a lynching by an indignant multitude, bent upon avenging the innocent victim of the crime, was matter for special congratulation". The editorial noted that, although the trial was hasty, "at least it was not a lynching". Adding that since a Negro had raped a white woman, "no other result could have been reached, however long the trial."
One fact alone establishes beyond question the prevalence of racial disparities in the historic application of the death penalty in the USA. Between colonial times and 1990, some 18,000 people were executed; of that total, only 30 cases involved the execution of a white person for the murder of a black person. In almost all those cases, the social status of the black victim was higher than the social status of the white perpetrator. In 10 cases, the black victim was a slave, and the murder was treated as a property crime against the white slave owner rather than a crime of violence against an African American.
Three centuries of racially discriminatory capital sentencing form the cultural backdrop against which the contemporary death penalty has evolved. Proponents of current procedures assert that the legal safeguards now in place are sufficient to eliminate all traces of racial bias. Amnesty International can find no proof to support this assertion. On the contrary; the administration of the death penalty in the United States remains both arbitrary and discriminatory. Beyond any reasonable doubt, the US death penalty continues to reflect the deeply-rooted prejudices of the society which condones its use.
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