Sentencing Issues: Purposes, Structures, and Eighth Amendment Limits
The sentencing domain covers the purposes of punishment, the structures that constrain judges, and Eighth Amendment limits on sanctions. Questions test whether you can identify which rationale or rule a scenario illustrates.
Purposes of punishment
- Retribution: just deserts - the sentence matches blameworthiness.
- Deterrence: specific (the offender) and general (the public).
- Incapacitation: restraint prevents future crime.
- Rehabilitation: treatment changes behavior.
- Restoration: repair harm to victims and community.
Sentencing structures
- Indeterminate: a range with parole-board release. Determinate: a fixed term set by statute.
- Mandatory minimums, three-strikes laws, and truth-in-sentencing laws limit judicial discretion.
- Guidelines: the federal Sentencing Guidelines were mandatory until United States v. Booker (2005) made them advisory; judges may depart or vary with reasons.
- Disparity and proportionality: sentencing commissions pursue uniformity; the Eighth Amendment bars sentences grossly disproportionate to the offense (Solem v. Helm).
Capital sentencing
- Furman v. Georgia (1972) invalidated unguided discretionary death sentencing; Gregg v. Georgia (1976) approved guided-discretion statutes using bifurcated trials and aggravating and mitigating factors.
- Categorical bars: Atkins (intellectual disability), Roper (offenders under 18), Hall v. Florida (rigid IQ cutoffs), Hurst v. Florida (jury must find aggravating factors).
Worked example
A judge imposes a 15-year term although the guidelines recommend 8–10 years, citing the defendant's prior violence and the need to protect the public. Because the guidelines are advisory after Booker, the sentence is permissible if the judge explains it and it is not substantively unreasonable. If instead a statute set a 15-year mandatory minimum, the judge would have no discretion to go lower.
Traps that cost marks
Saying Booker made the guidelines mandatory; confusing retribution with deterrence; assuming three-strikes laws are constitutionally barred; overlooking that Furman did not abolish the death penalty - Gregg reinstated it under guided discretion.