Kill the Death Penalty: Federal Executions and the struggle for Abolition

The practice of the death penalty - a government’s self-granted right to take the lives of its citizens - is increasingly untenable in countries worldwide. Yet, according to Amnesty International, the number of executions in the United States has put us in the top ten, company we share with several authoritarian countries who in most other circumstances are adversaries. Why is this alone insufficient to be dispositive on the cruelty and unusualness issue, for Eighth Amendment purposes? Beyond the dubious moral grounds upon with the American death penalty stands, and the suspicious international company it shares, there is a disturbing reality about its disproportionate use along racial lines. 

Join the Boston College Law ACS Student Chapter, the National Lawyers Guild, Boston College Law School Democrats, and Criminal Law Society for an event that will cover the important facts of the American death penalty, address myths and misnomers, ponder the retributive psychology used by its supporters, and highlight opportunities for today’s lawyers to get involved in the campaign to abolish the death penalty in America. To assist in understanding this topic we are excited to welcome Professor Alexis Hoag, Neil Fox, and Kacey Keeton.