NCJ Number
90640
Journal
Boston College Law Review Volume: 23 Issue: 3 Dated: (May 1982) Pages: 713-760
Date Published
1982
Length
48 pages
Annotation
This note discusses the eighth amendment (prohibition of cruel and unusual punishment) analysis relevant to prison overcrowding cases generally as well as the importance of the decision in Rhodes v. Chapman to future eighth amendment litigation.
Abstract
The eighth amendment has evolved from a narrow proscription on physically barbarous cruelties to a broad prohibition on any form of criminal punishment that affronts human dignity. Essential to the evolution of the clause has been the casting aside of the 'hands-off' doctrine to allow for increased judicial review of State prison conditions. Court decisions, however, have resulted in a plethora of standards of review. In Rhodes v. Chapman, the U.S. Supreme Court faced the prison overcrowding issue for the first time. In 'Rhodes,' the conditions of confinement at the Southern Ohio Correctional Facility were at issue. The Court held that double-celling -the practice of housing two prisoners in a one-person cell -- of long-term inmates did not constitute cruel and unusual punishment. Rather than articulating a clear and workable eighth amendment standard derived from prior Court decisions, the Court implicitly reverted to a retribution theory of punishment that sanctions long-term psychological suffering. In so doing, this decision departed from prior Supreme Court condition-of-confinement and eighth amendment cases. A two-tiered framework can be discerned in prior decisions. What is needed is the insertion of the components of a uniform standard of review reflecting a consistent judicial philosophy towards prisoners' rights. This note suggests use of the totality-of-conditions approach in the first tier and the human-dignity test in the second tier. This standard is sensitive to the individual nature of the eighth amendment's guarantee and responsiveness to prisoners' needs. A total of 430 footnotes are provided.