In the case of Beck v. Alabama, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that a defendant could not be sentenced to death if the jury was not permitted to consider a lesser charge. The court held this restriction violated the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments' prohibition against cruel and unusual punishment and due process respectively. This decision came about after John Beck Jr., who had been convicted for robbery-intentional killing in Alabama, appealed his death sentence on grounds that he should have been allowed to instruct jurors on non-capital offenses as well (i.e., felony murder). The state law at that time did not allow consideration of lesser charges in capital cases, which meant juries faced an all-or-nothing choice between conviction leading to a mandatory death penalty or acquittal. By ruling in favor of Beck, the Supreme Court effectively invalidated such laws across states.

In the dissenting opinion for Beck v. Alabama, Justice Rehnquist disagreed with the majority's decision to overturn an Alabama law that prohibited lesser included offense instructions in capital cases. He argued that this was a matter of state law and not federal constitutional law, thus it should be left to the states to decide. Furthermore, he contended that there was no evidence suggesting such laws led juries to convict defendants out of fear they would otherwise go free if acquitted on capital charges. The justice also pointed out inconsistencies in how the court treated different types of errors - while some were considered harmless unless proven substantial and injurious, others like those involved in this case were presumed prejudicial without requiring any proof from defendant about their impact on jury’s verdicts. In conclusion, Justice Rehnquist believed that by striking down Alabama's statute based on speculative harm rather than concrete evidence or established legal principles violated principles of federalism and judicial restraint.