Moot Court: Kennedy v. Louisiana

What this episode covers

Each spring, Alisa Rosenthal's Constitutional Law II: Civil Rights and Liberties class tries an actual supreme court case before a simulated court in what is called a Moot Court exercise, this is the oral argument audio from that case. From the Oyez Project: Anbsp;Louisiananbsp;court found Patricknbsp;Kennedynbsp;guilty of raping his eight-year-old stepdaughter.Louisiananbsp;law allows the district attorney to seek the death penalty for defendants found guilty of raping children under the age of twelve. The prosecutor sought, and the jury awarded, such a sentence;nbsp;Kennedynbsp;appealed. Thenbsp;Louisiananbsp;Supreme Court affirmed the imposition of the death sentence, noting that although the U.S. Supreme Court had struck down capital punishment for rape of an adult woman innbsp;Cokernbsp;v. Georgia, that ruling did not apply when the victim was a child. Rather thenbsp;Louisiananbsp;high court applied a balancing test set out by the Court innbsp;Atkinsnbsp;v. Virginiaandnbsp;Ropernbsp;v. Simmons, first examining whether there is a national consensus on the punishment and then considering whether the court would find the punishment excessive. In this case, thenbsp;Louisiananbsp;Supreme Court felt that the adoption of similar laws in five other states, coupled with the unique vulnerability of children, justified imposing the death penalty. In seeking certiorari,nbsp;Kennedynbsp;argued that five states do not constitute a "national consensus" for the purposes of Eighth Amendment analysis, thatnbsp;Cokernbsp;v. Georgianbsp;should apply to all rapes regardless of the age of the victim, and that the law was unfair in its application, singling out black child rapists for death at a significantly higher rate than whites.

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