Let juries decide on capital punishment
Dublin Core
Title
Let juries decide on capital punishment
Subject
Capital punishment (Canon law)
Capital punishment--United States
Jury ethics
Description
A letter to the editor by Michael A. Mello about Florida's somewhat confusing capital punishment statute and the influence of legislators and the Supreme Court.
Creator
Mello, Michael A.
Source
The Miami Herald
Publisher
HIST 298, University of Mary Washington
Date
1984-11-13
Rights
The materials in this online collection are held by Special Collections, Simpson Library, University of Mary Washington and are available for educational use. For this purpose only, you may reproduce materials without prior permission on the condition that you provide attribution of the source.
Format
1 JPG
300 dpi
Language
English
Coverage
Miami, Fl
Text Item Type Metadata
Text
To The Editor:
Your recent editorial urging legislative repeal of Florida’s jury override in capital cases was right on target. Earlier this year, the U.S. Supreme Court decided that Florida may, consistent with the Constitution, permit judges to impose death even if the jury votes for life imprisonment. But the question for Legislature remains: Should we retain the override? History, logic, and common sense counsel that we should not.
Capital punishment is an expression of society’s outrage at especially offensive conduct. In deciding whether a person deserves to live or die, the capital sentencer’s principal task is to decide where the individual defendant and his crime fall on the yardstick of community outrage. Because the death decision is a communal one, and because the jury is, by definition, the voice of the community, a greater degree of reliability is achieved if the representatives of the community are heard from and followed. A jury, selected in a fashion designed to assure representation is better able to convey the community’s will than a single judge.
For this reason, virtually every other state with the death penalty entrusts the sentencing decision to the jury and, until recently, Florida was no exception. In 1872, Florida entrusted its juries with the decision on death. There it remained until 1972, when the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that every capital statute in the nation (including Florida’s) was un-Constitutional. The problem was that the Supreme Court in 1972 did not tell the states how to correct the Constitutional flaw that had invalidated the statutes.
It was in the midst of this Constitutional confusion that the Florida Legislature set about drafting our present statute. The override was thus a product of understandable confusion over what the Constitution required of a capital-punishment statute. The legislative history and subsequent judicial construction of the override show that Florida’s decision to employ this curious device was the death penalty in a form consistent with the Constitution, rather than a legislative judgment that judges make better capital sentencers. But the years since 1972 have taught that the override is not required by the Constitution. In fact, of the 38 states with the death penalty, 30 require a jury’s consent for death. In five of the other state, the judge alone decides penalty. In the only three states, including Florida, does the jury make a non-binding recommendation. Almost every other jurisdiction with the death penalty has rejected the jury override, and for good reason. Florida should join them.
Michael A. Mello
Assistant Public Defender
Editor’s Note: Mr. Mello was the counsel in Spaziano vs. Florida, the case in which the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the Constitutionality of Florida’s jury override.
Your recent editorial urging legislative repeal of Florida’s jury override in capital cases was right on target. Earlier this year, the U.S. Supreme Court decided that Florida may, consistent with the Constitution, permit judges to impose death even if the jury votes for life imprisonment. But the question for Legislature remains: Should we retain the override? History, logic, and common sense counsel that we should not.
Capital punishment is an expression of society’s outrage at especially offensive conduct. In deciding whether a person deserves to live or die, the capital sentencer’s principal task is to decide where the individual defendant and his crime fall on the yardstick of community outrage. Because the death decision is a communal one, and because the jury is, by definition, the voice of the community, a greater degree of reliability is achieved if the representatives of the community are heard from and followed. A jury, selected in a fashion designed to assure representation is better able to convey the community’s will than a single judge.
For this reason, virtually every other state with the death penalty entrusts the sentencing decision to the jury and, until recently, Florida was no exception. In 1872, Florida entrusted its juries with the decision on death. There it remained until 1972, when the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that every capital statute in the nation (including Florida’s) was un-Constitutional. The problem was that the Supreme Court in 1972 did not tell the states how to correct the Constitutional flaw that had invalidated the statutes.
It was in the midst of this Constitutional confusion that the Florida Legislature set about drafting our present statute. The override was thus a product of understandable confusion over what the Constitution required of a capital-punishment statute. The legislative history and subsequent judicial construction of the override show that Florida’s decision to employ this curious device was the death penalty in a form consistent with the Constitution, rather than a legislative judgment that judges make better capital sentencers. But the years since 1972 have taught that the override is not required by the Constitution. In fact, of the 38 states with the death penalty, 30 require a jury’s consent for death. In five of the other state, the judge alone decides penalty. In the only three states, including Florida, does the jury make a non-binding recommendation. Almost every other jurisdiction with the death penalty has rejected the jury override, and for good reason. Florida should join them.
Michael A. Mello
Assistant Public Defender
Editor’s Note: Mr. Mello was the counsel in Spaziano vs. Florida, the case in which the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the Constitutionality of Florida’s jury override.
Original Format
Newspaper letter to the editor
Contributor of the Digital Item
Muchnick, Andrew
Student Editor of the Digital Item
Williams, Megan
Files
Citation
Mello, Michael A., “Let juries decide on capital punishment,” HIST299, accessed March 12, 2026, https://hist299.umwhistory.org/items/show/84.