Corporal Punishment

Corporal Punishment

Introduction

Universal human rights claim that no human being shall subject to be given a punishment that is being unusual and inhuman, or that is being cruel in nature. This foremost right of humanity has been made a legitimate part of the US constitutional law and it has also been made an integral part of the US constitutional morality. Corporal sentence is considered as cruel and inhumane. In the US, provision of corporal retribution to criminals has been viewed as nasty, and a bizarre act and most of the US judges, practitioners, lawyers and scholars have voted against this heinous dealing.

To define this approach of punishing criminals, it is being done by the use of physical force on a person to make him suffer a certain degree of discomfort or pain. The practice is intended to educate, control, punish, or teach discipline to those who are been recognized as criminal minds in the eyes of the law. Corporal punishments may turn into sternness ranging from a simple slap to a thorough beating. The context in which it is administered varies.

For several decades, physical punishment has made its place as a custom in educational, judicial, and domestic settings. In ancient Greece and Rome, whippings and Sticks have been used as a common tool to beat. However, the rising sun of the 19th century brought gradual decline in the social acceptability of this traditional norm of corporal punishments. Despite this fact, corporal punishments, including the capital punishment is prevailing in many countries.

Corporal Punishment in Judicial System

The corporal punishment is a type of criminal punishment which involves torturing the criminals publicly. This practice initiated in the ancient times and was prevalent in several countries. Initially, the corporal punishment was restricted to certain groups, but after the thirteen century, the corporal punishment was widely implied and was utilized for the criminals belonging to any of the groups with no exclusion (Paolucci & Violato, 2004).

It is believed that this wide spread of the capital punishment was under the influence of Mongolian and Tarter conquerors, which openly started practicing corporal punishments. Period of the sixteenth and seventeenth century saw an extensive use of corporal punishments mainly because of the population's total enslavement to the state of that time and was at its peak in the start of the eighteenth century. During that era, all inhuman practices were employed, and these capital punishments were given in plain view of the public (Humphreys, 2008).

However, after the first quarter of the eighteenth century, the corporal punishments underwent a drastic change in the judicial system. During the colonial era, the punishments were divided into three types: corporal punishments like capital punishments, whipping, beating etc, shaming and putting the criminals in stocks. After the revolution, concerns started to emerge regarding the cruel and unusual nature of the corporal and the capital punishments. This initiated an increase in the prisons (Scarre, 2003).

The Enlightenment thoughts influenced the Americans that confining the criminals in an institution and imposing proper order will assist in the ...