In the case of Bell v. Ohio, 1977, the United States Supreme Court was tasked with determining whether or not a mandatory death penalty for aggravated murder during a kidnapping violated the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments' prohibition against cruel and unusual punishment. The court ruled in favor of Bell, deciding that such an automatic sentence did indeed violate these constitutional protections. This decision was based on previous rulings which held that capital punishment must be applied judiciously and take into account individual circumstances surrounding each crime to ensure proportionality between offense severity and punishment imposed. Therefore, any law mandating a death sentence without considering mitigating factors would be unconstitutional as it fails to allow for individualized sentencing considerations.

In the dissenting opinion for Bell v. Ohio, Justice Brennan disagreed with the majority's decision to uphold death penalty statutes in Ohio and Texas. He argued that these laws were unconstitutional because they violated the Eighth Amendment's prohibition against cruel and unusual punishment. Justice Brennan believed that capital punishment was inherently cruel due to its severity and finality, regardless of how it was administered or what crime it was intended to punish. Furthermore, he contended that these laws were arbitrary in their application as they allowed juries too much discretion in deciding who would receive a death sentence without providing clear guidelines on how this determination should be made. This lack of guidance could lead to inconsistent sentencing outcomes based on factors unrelated to the seriousness of a defendant’s crimes or character such as race or socioeconomic status which is fundamentally unfair and unjust.