In the late 1960s and early 1970s, the United States went years without using the death penalty. Not a single person was killed by injection, firing squad, hanging, or electric chair. But by the late 90s, we were killing around 100 convicted criminals per year. What happened?
Furman v. Georgia
In 1972, the Supreme Court handed down its decision in Furman v. Georgia, which negated state capital punishment laws across the country. This meant that some of the worst criminals in the country were suddenly given new sentences. And Americans… lost their minds. Within just a few years, new laws were written, and the Court decided to approve many of them.
The death penalty long had a prejudiced bent, disproportionately killing people of color. The NAACP worked hard to end the practice, but those efforts were soon undone as American opinions toward the death penalty abruptly changed.
My special guest for this episode is Maurice Chammah, author of Let the Lord Sort Them: The Rise and Fall of the Death Penalty
Sources:
Let the Lord Sort Them: The Rise and Fall of the Death Penalty by Maurice Chammah
The Death Penalty: An American History by Stuart Banner (an excellent source!)
Reaganland by Rick Perlstein
The Hijacking of American Flight 119: How D.B. Cooper Inspired a Hijacking Craze and the FBI’s Battle to Stop It. by John Wigger
How Bob Jones University fought against integration
Bob Jones University v. United States (1983) was a landmark U.S. Supreme Court case that addressed whether the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) could deny tax-exempt status to private religious schools that practiced racially discriminatory policies. Bob Jones University, a fundamentalist Christian institution, prohibited interracial dating and marriage among its students based on its religious beliefs. In 1970, the IRS revised its policy to deny tax-exempt status to private schools with racially discriminatory admissions policies, prompting Bob Jones University to file suit after losing its exemption.
Evangelical support of segregation academies had a lot to do with tax exemptions
The university argued that the IRS’s actions violated its First Amendment rights to free exercise of religion. The central question for the Court was whether the government’s interest in eradicating racial discrimination in education outweighed the burden on religious freedom imposed by the denial of tax-exempt status. The case thus pitted two core constitutional principles against each other: religious liberty and the government’s interest in promoting equality.
In an 8–1 decision, the Supreme Court upheld the IRS’s position. Chief Justice Warren Burger, writing for the majority, stated that tax-exempt status is a form of government subsidy and that organizations seeking this benefit must serve a public interest. The Court held that eliminating racial discrimination in education was a “fundamental, overriding interest” that justified the burden on the university’s religious practices. It emphasized that the government is not required to subsidize discriminatory behavior, even when it is religiously motivated.
Why was Bob Jones University v. The United States important?
The ruling had significant implications. It clarified that tax-exempt status is conditional upon compliance with fundamental public policy, including civil rights laws. The decision reinforced the principle that religious freedom, while protected, does not allow institutions to violate core public values when receiving government benefits. This case remains a key precedent in balancing religious liberty with broader societal interests in equality and nondiscrimination.
McNamar’s testimony, pp.225, Hearing Before the Committee on Finance, United States Senate, Ninety-Seventh Congress, Second Session, February 1, 1982. (Thanks to the Senate Historian’s Office)
“The Bob Jones Decision: A Dangerous Precedent” by Kenneth S. Kantzer. September 2, 1983, issue of Christianity Today.
Randall Balmer’s article for Politico that narrows the blame for the bonding of evangelicals to the GOP to race
