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The Daily Dose/April 17, 2008
By Gaylon Kent
The Writer's Shack
   
A lot of dry, technical matter today campers, including admiralty and contract law, Supreme Court opinions and 1908 Chicago Cubs! Enjoy! Plus Salma Hayek is the Column Four Foto!
ON THIS DATE: In 1492, after two years of negotiations, King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella of Spain and Christopher Columbus sign a contract for Columbus to lead an expedition west to find a new sailing route to India. The contract calls for Spain to pay for half the expedition, with investors gathered by Columbus paying the other half. The contract made Columbus "Admiral of the Seas" and promised him many titles and other rewards if he discovered any new lands. He would also share in any profits of the venture and would be given the opportunity to buy into any commercial ventures in the new lands and would be allowed to spend eternity being attended to by pretty mermaids.
Anchors Aweigh! Columbus ultimately made four voyages west. He was arrested in 1500, and though King Ferdinand freed Columbus and restored his wealth and position and even funded his fourth voyage to the New World (which until he died he always thought was Asia) legal disputes between Columbus's descendants and Spain would continue until 1790.
We're Outta Here: On this date in 1861 Virginia becomes the eighth state to secede from the United States. It comes five days after the Battle of Fort Sumter in South Carolina began.
Editors Note: As a pubic service, the On This Date feature is pleased to chronicle 1908 Chicago Cubs baseball season. As some of you may have heard, it was the last time the Cubs won the World Series.
Start Printing Those Playoff Tickets: The Chicago Cubs moved to 3-0 for third time this century (1907, 1902 were the other times) beating Cincinnati 1-0 100 years ago today. Most accounts of the game focus on Reds left fielder Hans Lobert who was making one of his 23 outfield appearances in a 1,200 game major league career, and, was escorted off the field by police after a fan alleged he spat on him after fans in left field had the nerve to yell at Lobert who appeared to have trouble catching the ball. Also, Reds manager John Ganzel was ejected for "disputing a decision" by plate umpire Hank O'Day.
For The Record: The Cubs got a run in the sixth and mustered eight hits, including two triples and a double,
Quick Hook: Cubs starting pitcher Ed Ruelbach was pulled in the first inning after walking the first two batters.
Elsewhere In The National League: Pittsburgh defeated St. Louis 3-0. New York defeated Philadelphia 14-2 and Brooklyn defeated Boston 3-2. The Cubs remain in first place, tied with Pittsburgh and after the game took the train to St. Louis to begin a series with the Cardinals.
NOT THE RULING THEY WERE HOPING FOR: A challenge by Kentucky death row inmates Ralph Baze and Thomas Bowling to that state's lethal injection protocol was rejected by the US Supreme Court Wednesday. The inmates had argued, after having lost in Kentucky state court and at the Kentucky Supreme Court, that Kentucky's current execution protocol, specifically the portion which calls for the administering of sodium thiopental as the first of three drugs, violated the Eighth Amendment's ban on cruel and unusual punishment.
The condemned men argued there are not sufficient safeguards in place to ensure the first drug does what it supposed to, namely render the inmate unconscious and immune to whatever pain the following drugs, designed to stop the inmate's lungs and heart, might inflict.
Now Here This: In his opinion affirming the lower court's ruling, Chief Justice John Roberts acknowledged that while "some risk of pain is inherent in even the most humane execution method…the Constitution does not demand the avoidance of all risk of pain", citing the 1947 opinion in Francis v. Resweber.
History Lesson: In Francis v. Resweber the court held that an isolated mishap does not suggest cruelty or "substantial risk of serious harm". The Francis in this case was one Willie Francis, who Louisiana had tried to execute in 1946. The attempt, and we are not making this up, failed, the delivered current being unable to kill Francis because the portable electric chair was set up incorrectly by a drunk inmate. After losing at the Supreme Court, Francis was executed in 1947 and was 16 at the time of his death. Resweber was the last name of the sheriff charged with carrying out the execution.
It's OK For Humans, Though: One of the drugs used to induce death in lethal injection procedures, pancuronium bromide, is outlawed in several states - including Kentucky - when putting animals down because of the substantial risk of pain.
Really Dry, Technical Matter: While the vote was 7-2, you need a scorecard to figure out who consented to what. Only justices Anthony Kennedy and Samuel Alito joined Roberts' opinion and Alito issued a concurring opinion of his own. Antonin Scalia and ClarenceThomas also provided their own concurring opinions and then got together and held hands and joined each other's concurring opinions. Justice Stephen Breyer issued a concurring opnion, too. Ruth Bader Ginsberg issued a dissenting opinion, which was joined by David Souter.
I Concur, More Or Less: Justice John Paul Stevens filed a concurring opinion that in some places reads like a dissent, noting that recent decisions by courts, legislatures and Congress reaffirming the death penalty "are the product of habit and inattention rather than an acceptable deliberative process that weights the cost and risks of the ultimate punishment.
Uh, This Guy Voted Yes?: Stevens, still a rascal the week before his 88th birthday, also discussed the "three societal purposes" of the death penalty "incapacitation, deterrence and retribution" and how societal attitudes change over time:
"Full recognition of the diminishing force of the principal rationales for retaining the death penalty should lead this court and legislatures to re-examine the question recently posed by Professor [Lupe] Salinas, a former Texas prosecutor and judge: is it time to kill the death penalty?"
Yeah, Whatever: Stevens, annoyingly, voted on the merits of the case instead of using his position to advance a personal cause, ultimately ruling "I am persuaded that the evidence adduced by petitioners fails to prove that Kentucky's lethal injection protocol violates the Eighth Amendment. Accordingly, I join the Court's judgment."
Too Much Time On Our Hands: In her dissent, Ginsberg acknowledged that while lethal injection can "in most instances result in a painless death" mistakes are possible and "…the consequences of a mistake about the condemned inmates consciousness are horrendous and effectively undetectable after injection of the second drug" and said she would prefer to send the matter back to Kentucky with instructions "…to consider whether the failure to include readily available safeguards to confirm that the inmate is unconscious…in combination with the other elements of Kentucky's protocol, creates an untoward, readily avoidable risk of inflicting severe and unnecessary pain".
FunFact: This is the third time the Supreme Court has ruled on a specific method of execution. In 1890 it upheld electrocution and in 1879 it said a firing squad wasn't cruel and unusual punishment.
Answer To The Last Trivia Question: Pope Paul VI was the first pope to visit the United States, visiting New York City in 1965.
Today's Trivia Question: Serving since 1975, John Paul Stevens has been on Supreme Court the longest. Who has been on the Supreme Court the next longest? - Answer next time!
Threats? Recipes? Trivia question answers? Email The Writer's Shack Here!
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