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Lethal Injection: A Constitutional Violation Of The 8th Amendment

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The lethal injection executions illustrates a constitutional violation of the branch 's overreach as described by the 8th amendment due to its cases bring either successful in the execution or providing sufferable pain to death row inmates. One of the current problems in the Judicial branch is the use of lethal injection towards execution sessions. Lethal injection is an injection that is administered for the purpose of euthanasia and capital punishment. There are two methods of lethal injection today, one using a three drug protocol and the 2nd being the large dose of barbiturate. Lethal injection is used for capital punishment as it follows the 8th amendment we have today. The 8th amendment states that “Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted”. Justice Samuel and four other justices conclude that the lethal injection does not cause harm and does not violate the 8th amendment according to this article. “ Testimony from both sides supports the District Court’s conclusion that midazolam(medicine) can render a person insensate to pain” says Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr. Justice …show more content…

According to this article, to name a few, through history, it started from hangings in 1879, then electrocution by chair in 1890, until it reached lethal injection in 2008 where it deemed more humane. Several opinions were added in order to conduct an alternative method that would have a little to no chance in violating the 8th amendment. Officials can act unconstitutionally if they were to execute a condemned person in a procedure that intentionally makes it painful or in another way where they did not care whether it actually was. Due to this, this mostly continued to set an outer limit on how the death penalty can be carried out and since the court was unable to gather an actual majority to decipher the limit more

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