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Frontmatter -- Acknowledgments -- Contents -- Introduction -- 1. In Search of Community Sentiment -- 2. Understanding Nullification -- 3. Revealing Jurors' Sentiments -- 4. How Jurors Construct Reality -- 5. Objectivity versus Subjectivity in the Law -- 6. The Sacred Precinct of the Bedroom -- 7. The Right to Die -- 8. Cruel and Unusual Punishment -- 9. Murther Most Foul -- 10. Death Is Different -- 11. The Juvenile Death Penalty -- 12. On Self-Defense Justice -- 13. The Self-Defense Drama -- 14. The Maddening Changes in Insanity Law -- 15. How Jurors Construe Insanity -- 16. Murderous Passions, Mitigating Sentiments -- 17. The Path of Commonsense Justice -- Notes -- Index

Politicians, armed with opinion polls for support, rush to enact crime bills where sentences grow steeper, where higher minimum sentences are made mandatory, and where the death sentence is applied in more cases. Despite apparent support from suspect polls, the empirical question remains: Does community sentiment favor "steeper-firmer-deadlier" punishments that are disproportionate to the act and invariate to the actors, or does sentiment favor individualized and proportionate punishment? In experiments dealing with recidivist, accessory felony-murder, and perpetrator-by-means cases—where the law asks for excessive or invariate punishment—subjects favor proportional and individualized punishment and judge defendants based on perceived culpability.