JUSTICE POWELL delivered the opinion of the Court.

This case presents the question whether a complex statistical study that indicates a risk that racial considerations enter into capital sentencing determinations proves that petitioner McCleskey's capital sentence is unconstitutional under the
Eighth or Fourteenth Amendment.

McCleskey, a black man, was convicted of two counts of armed robbery and one count of murder in the Superior Court of
Fulton County, Georgia, on October 12, 1978. McCleskey's convictions arose out of the robbery of a furniture store and the
killing of a white police officer during the course of the robbery. The evidence at trial indicated that McCleskey and three
accomplices planned and carried out the robbery. All four were armed. McCleskey entered the front of the store while the
other three entered the rear. McCleskey secured the front of the store by rounding up the customers and forcing them to lie
face down on the floor. The other three rounded up the employees in the rear and tied them up with tape. The manager was
forced at gunpoint to turn over the store receipts, his watch, and $6. During the course of the robbery, a police officer,
answering a silent alarm, entered the store through the front door. As he was walking down the center aisle of the store, two
shots were fired. Both struck the officer. One hit him in the face and killed him.

Several weeks later, McCleskey was arrested in connection with an unrelated offense. He confessed that he had participated in
the furniture store robbery, but denied that he had shot the police officer. At trial, the State introduced evidence that at least one
of the bullets that struck the officer was fired from a .38 caliber Rossi revolver. This description matched the description of the
gun that McCleskey had carried during the robbery. The State also introduced the testimony of two witnesses who had heard
McCleskey admit to the shooting.

The jury convicted McCleskey of murder. At the penalty hearing, the jury heard arguments as to the appropriate sentence.
Under Georgia law, the jury could not consider imposing the death penalty unless it found beyond a reasonable doubt that the
murder was accompanied by one of the statutory aggravating circumstances.  The jury in this case found two aggravating  circumstances to exist beyond a reasonable doubt: the murder was committed during the course of an armed robbery, and the murder was committed upon a peace officer engaged in the performance of his duties. In making its decision whether to impose the death sentence, the jury considered the mitigating and aggravating circumstances of McCleskey's conduct. McCleskey offered no mitigating evidence. The jury recommended that he be sentenced to death on the murder charge and to consecutive life sentences on the armed robbery charges. The court followed the jury's recommendation and sentenced McCleskey to death.

McCleskey  filed a petition for a writ of habeas corpus in the Federal District Court for the Northern District of Georgia.
His petition raised 18 claims, one of which was that the Georgia capital sentencing process is administered in a racially
discriminatory manner in violation of the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments to the United States Constitution. In support of his
claim, McCleskey proffered a statistical study performed by Professors David C. Baldus, Charles Pulaski, and George
Woodworth (the Baldus study) that purports to show a disparity in the imposition of the death sentence in Georgia based on
the race of the murder victim and, to a lesser extent, the race of the defendant. The Baldus study is actually two sophisticated
statistical studies that examine over 2,000 murder cases that occurred in Georgia during the 1970's. The raw numbers collected
by Professor Baldus indicate that defendants charged with killing white persons received the death penalty in 11% of the cases,
but defendants charged with killing blacks received the death penalty in only 1% of the cases. The raw numbers also indicate a
reverse racial disparity according to the race of the defendant: 4% of the black defendants received the death penalty, as
opposed to 7% of the white defendants.

Baldus also divided the cases according to the combination of the race of the defendant and the race of the victim. He found
that the death penalty was assessed in 22% of the cases involving black defendants and white victims; 8% of the cases involving
white defendants and white victims; 1% of the cases involving black defendants and black victims; and 3% of the cases
involving white defendants and black victims.  Similarly, Baldus found that prosecutors sought the death penalty
in 70% of the cases involving black defendants and white victims; 32% of the cases involving white defendants and white
victims; 15% of the cases involving black defendants and black victims; and 19% of the cases involving white defendants and
black victims.

Baldus subjected his data to an extensive analysis, taking account of 230 variables that could have explained the disparities on
nonracial grounds. One of his models concludes that, even after taking account of 39 nonracial variables, defendants charged
with killing white victims were 4.3 times as likely to receive a death sentence as defendants charged with killing blacks.
According to this model, black defendants were 1.1 times as likely to receive a death sentence as other defendants. Thus, the
Baldus study indicates that black defendants, such as McCleskey, who kill white victims have the greatest likelihood of
receiving the death penalty.

McCleskey's first claim is that the Georgia capital punishment statute violates the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth
Amendment. He argues that race has infected the administration of Georgia's statute in two ways: persons who murder whites
are more likely to be sentenced to death than persons who murder blacks, and black murderers are more likely to be
sentenced to death than white murderers. As a black defendant who killed a white victim, McCleskey claims that the Baldus study demonstrates that he was discriminated against because of his race and because of the race of his victim. In its broadest form, McCleskey's claim of discrimination extends to every actor in the Georgia capital sentencing process, from the prosecutor who sought the death penalty and the jury that imposed the sentence, to the State itself that enacted the capital
punishment statute and allows it to remain in effect despite its allegedly discriminatory application. We agree with the Court of
Appeals, and every other court that has considered such a challenge, that this claim must fail...

                                                                                              III

McCleskey also argues that the Baldus study demonstrates that the Georgia capital sentencing system violates the Eighth
Amendment.We begin our analysis of this claim by reviewing the restrictions on death sentences established by our prior
decisions under that Amendment.

The Eighth Amendment prohibits infliction of "cruel and unusual punishments." This Court's early Eighth Amendment cases
examined only the "particular methods of execution to determine whether they were too cruel to pass constitutional muster."
Subsequently, the Court recognized that the constitutional prohibition against cruel and unusual punishments "is not fastened to the obsolete but may acquire meaning as public opinion becomes enlightened by a humane justice." Weems, v. United States, 217 U.S. 349, 378 (1910). In Weems, the Court identified a second principle inherent in the Eighth Amendment, "that punishment for crime should be graduated and proportioned to offense."

Two principal decisions guide our resolution of McCleskey's Eighth Amendment claim. In Furman v. Georgia, 408 U.S. 238
(1972), the Court concluded that the death penalty was so irrationally imposed that any particular death sentence could be
presumed excessive. Under the statutes at issue in Furman, there was no basis for determining in any particular case whether
the penalty was proportionate to the crime: "[T]he death penalty [was] exacted with great infrequency even for the most
atrocious crimes and . . . there [was] no meaningful basis for distinguishing the few cases in which it [was] imposed from the
many cases in which it [was] not."

In Gregg, the Court specifically addressed the question left open in Furman - whether the punishment of death for murder is
"under all circumstances, `cruel and unusual' in violation of the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments of the Constitution."  We noted that the imposition of the death penalty for the crime of murder "has a long history of acceptance both in the United States and in England." . "The most marked indication of society's endorsement of the death penalty for murder [was] the legislative response to Furman." During the 4-year period between Furman and Gregg, at least 35 States had reenacted the death penalty.  We noted that any punishment might be unconstitutionally severe if inflicted without
penological justification, but concluded:

"Considerations of federalism, as well as respect for the ability of a legislature to evaluate, in terms of its particular State,
the moral consensus concerning the death penalty and its social utility as a sanction, require us to conclude, in the absence of more convincing evidence, that the infliction of death as a punishment for murder is not without justification and thus is not unconstitutionally severe."

The second question before the Court in Gregg was the constitutionality of the particular procedures embodied in the Georgia
capital punishment statute. We explained the fundamental principle of Furman, that "where discretion is afforded a sentencing
body on a matter so grave as the determination of whether a human life should be taken or spared, that discretion must be
suitably directed and limited so as to minimize the risk of wholly arbitrary and capricious action."  Numerous features of the then new Georgia statute met the concerns articulated in Furman....

In sum, our decisions since Furman have identified a constitutionally permissible range of discretion in imposing the death
penalty. First, there is a required threshold below which the death penalty cannot be imposed. In this context, the State must
establish rational criteria that narrow the decisionmaker's judgment as to whether the circumstances of a particular defendant's
case meet the threshold. Moreover, a societal consensus that the death penalty is disproportionate  to a particular offense prevents a State from imposing the death penalty for that offense. Second, States cannot limit the sentencer's consideration of any relevant circumstance that could cause it to decline to impose the penalty. In this respect, the State cannot channel the sentencer's discretion, but must allow it to consider any relevant information offered by the defendant.

In light of our precedents under the Eighth Amendment, McCleskey cannot argue successfully that his sentence is
"disproportionate to the crime in the traditional sense."  He does not deny that he committed a murder in the course of a planned robbery, a crime for which this Court has determined that the death penalty constitutionally may be imposed. Gre His disproportionality claim "is of a different sort."  McCleskey argues that the sentences in his case is disproportionate to the sentences in other murder cases.

On the one hand, he cannot base a constitutional claim on an argument that his case differs from other cases in which
defendants did receive the death penalty. On automatic appeal, the Georgia Supreme Court found that McCleskey's death
sentence was not disproportionate to other death sentences imposed in the State.

On the other hand, absent a showing that the Georgia capital punishment system operates in an arbitrary and capricious
manner, McCleskey cannot prove a constitutional  violation by demonstrating that other defendants who may be similarly situated did not receive the death penalty. In Gregg, the Court confronted the argument that "the opportunities for
discretionary action that are inherent in the processing of any murder case under Georgia law," specifically the opportunities for discretionary leniency, rendered the capital sentences imposed arbitrary and capricious. Because McCleskey's sentence was imposed under Georgia sentencing procedures that focus discretion "on the particularized nature of the crime and the particularized characteristics of the individual defendant," id., at 206, we lawfully may presume that McCleskey's death sentence was not "wantonly and freakishly" imposed, and thus that the sentence is not disproportionate within any recognized meaning under the Eighth Amendment.

Although our decision in Gregg as to the facial validity of the Georgia capital punishment statute appears to foreclose
McCleskey's disproportionality argument, he further contends that the Georgia capital punishment system is arbitrary and
capricious in application, and therefore his sentence is excessive, because racial considerations may influence capital sentencing
decisions in Georgia. We now address this claim.

To evaluate McCleskey's challenge, we must examine exactly what the Baldus study may show. Even Professor Baldus does
not contend that his statistics prove that race enters into any capital sentencing decisions or that race was a factor in
McCleskey's particular case. Statistics at most may show only a likelihood that a particular factor entered into some
decisions. There is, of course, some risk of racial prejudice influencing a jury's decision in a criminal case. There are similar
risks that other kinds of prejudice will influence other criminal trials. McCleskey asks us to accept the likelihood allegedly shown by the Baldus study as the constitutional measure of an unacceptable risk of racial prejudice influencing capital sentencing decisions. This we decline to do.

Because of the risk that the factor of race may enter the criminal justice process, we have engaged in "unceasing efforts" to
eradicate racial prejudice from our criminal justice system.  Our efforts have been guided by our recognition that "the inestimable privilege of trial by jury . . . is a vital principle, underlying the whole administration of criminal justice."  Specifically, a capital sentencing jury representative of a criminal defendant's community assures a "`diffused impartiality.'"

Individual jurors bring to their deliberations "qualities of human nature and varieties of human experience, the range of which is
unknown and perhaps unknowable." . The capital sentencing decision requires the individual jurors to focus their collective judgment on the unique characteristics of a particular criminal defendant. It is not surprising that such collective judgments often are difficult to explain. But the inherent lack of predictability of jury decisions does not justify their condemnation. On the contrary, it is the jury's function to make the difficult and uniquely human judgments that defy codification and that "buil[d] discretion, equity, and flexibility into a legal system."

McCleskey's argument that the Constitution condemns the discretion allowed decisionmakers in the Georgia capital sentencing
system is antithetical to the fundamental role of discretion in our criminal justice system. Discretion in the criminal justice system
offers substantial benefits to the criminal defendant. Not only can a jury decline to impose the death sentence, it can decline to
convict or choose to convict of a lesser offense. Whereas decisions against a defendant's interest may be reversed by the trial
judge or on appeal, these discretionary exercises of leniency are final and unreviewable.  Of course, "the power to be lenient
[also] is the power to discriminate,"  but a capital punishment system that did not allow for discretionary acts of leniency "would be totally alien to our notions of criminal justice."

At most, the Baldus study indicates a discrepancy that appears to correlate with race. Apparent disparities in sentencing are an
inevitable part of our criminal justice system. The discrepancy indicated by the Baldus study is "a far cry from the major systemic defects identified in Furman."  As this Court has recognized, any mode for determining guilt or punishment "has its weaknesses and the potential for misuse." Specifically, "there can be `no perfect procedure for deciding in which cases governmental authority should be used to impose death.'" Where the discretion that is fundamental to our criminal process is involved, we decline to assume that what is unexplained is invidious. In light of the safeguards designed to minimize racial bias in the process, the fundamental value of jury trial in our criminal justice system, and the benefits that discretion provides to criminal defendants, we hold that the Baldus study does not demonstrate a constitutionally significant risk of racial bias affecting the Georgia capital sentencing process.

                                               V

Two additional concerns inform our decision in this case. First, McCleskey's claim, taken to its logical conclusion, throws into serious question the principles that underlie our entire criminal justice system. The Eighth Amendment is not limited in application to capital punishment, but applies to all penalties.  Thus, if we accepted McCleskey's claim that racial bias has impermissibly tainted the capital sentencing decision, we could soon be faced with similar claims as to other types of penalty.Moreover, the claim that his sentence rests on the irrelevant factor of race easily could be extended to apply to claims based on unexplained discrepancies that correlate to membership in other minority groups, even to gender. Similarly, since McCleskey's claim relates to the race of his victim, other claims could apply with equally logical force to statistical disparities that correlate with the race or sex of other actors in the criminal justice system, such as defense attorneys or judges. Also, there is no logical reason that such a claim need be limited to racial or sexual bias. If arbitrary and capricious punishment is the touchstone under the Eighth Amendment, such a claim could - at least in theory - be based upon any arbitrary variable, such as the defendant's facial characteristics, or the physical attractiveness of the defendant or the victim, that some statistical study indicates may be influential in jury decisionmaking. As these examples illustrate, there is no limiting principle to the type of challenge brought by McCleskey. The Constitution does not require that a State eliminate any demonstrable disparity that correlates with a potentially irrelevant factor in order to operate a criminal justice system that includes capital punishment. As we have stated specifically in the context of capital punishment, the Constitution does not "plac[e] totally unrealistic conditions on its use."

Second, McCleskey's arguments are best presented to the legislative bodies. It is not the responsibility - or indeed even the
right - of this Court to determine the appropriate punishment for particular crimes. It is the legislatures, the elected
representatives of the people, that are "constituted to respond to the will and consequently the moral values of the people."
. Legislatures also are better qualified to weigh and "evaluate the results of statistical studies in terms of their own local conditions and with a flexibility of approach that is not available to the court.,"

Accordingly, we affirm the judgment of the Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit.
 

JUSTICE BRENNAN, with whom JUSTICE MARSHALL joins, and with whom JUSTICE BLACKMUN and JUSTICE STEVENS join in all but Part I, dissenting.

                                                I

Adhering to my view that the death penalty is in all circumstances cruel and unusual punishment forbidden by the Eighth and
Fourteenth Amendments, I would vacate the decision below insofar as it left undisturbed the death sentence imposed in this
case.

Even if I did not hold this position, however, I would reverse the Court of Appeals, for petitioner McCleskey has clearly
demonstrated that his death sentence was imposed in violation of the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments. McCleskey has also demonstrated precisely the type of risk of irrationality in sentencing that we have consistently condemned in our Eighth Amendment jurisprudence.

                                               II

At some point in this case, Warren McCleskey doubtless asked his lawyer whether a jury was likely to sentence him to die. A
candid reply to this question would have been disturbing. First, counsel would have to tell McCleskey that few of the details of
the crime or of McCleskey's past criminal conduct were more important than the fact that his victim was white. Furthermore, counsel would feel bound to tell McCleskey that defendants charged with killing white victims in Georgia are 4.3 times as likely to be sentenced to death as defendants charged with killing blacks.In addition, frankness would compel the disclosure that it was more likely than not that the race of McCleskey's victim would determine whether he received a death sentence: 6 of every 11 defendants convicted of killing a white person would not have received the death penalty if their victims had been black, while, among defendants with aggravating and mitigating factors comparable to McCleskey's, 20 of every 34 would not have been sentenced to die if their victims had been black. Finally, the assessment would not be complete without the information that cases involving black defendants and white victims are more likely to result in a death sentence than cases featuring any other racial combination of defendant and victim.  The story could be told in a variety of ways, but McCleskey could not fail to
grasp its essential narrative line: there was a significant chance that race would play a prominent role in determining if he lived or
died.

The Court today holds that Warren McCleskey's sentence was constitutionally imposed. It finds no fault in a system in which
lawyers must tell their clients that race casts a  large shadow on the capital sentencing process. The Court arrives at this conclusion by stating that the Baldus study cannot "prove that race enters into any capital sentencing decisions or that race was a factor in McCleskey's particular case." Ante, at 308 (emphasis in original). Since, according to Professor Baldus, we cannot say "to a moral certainty" that race influenced a decision, ante, at 308, n. 29, we can identify only "a likelihood that a particular factor entered into some decisions," ante, at 308, and "a discrepancy that appears to correlate with race."  This "likelihood" and "discrepancy," holds the Court, is insufficient to establish a constitutional violation. The Court reaches this conclusion by placing four factors on the scales opposite McCleskey's evidence: the desire to encourage sentencing discretion, the existence of "statutory safeguards" in the Georgia scheme, the fear of encouraging widespread challenges to other sentencing decisions, and the limits of the judicial role. The Court's evaluation of the significance of petitioner's evidence is fundamentally at odds with our consistent concern for rationality in capital sentencing, and the considerations that the majority invokes to discount that evidence cannot justify ignoring its force.

                                               III

                                               A

It is important to emphasize at the outset that the Court's observation that McCleskey cannot prove the influence of race on any
particular sentencing decision is irrelevant in evaluating his Eighth Amendment claim. Since Furman v. Georgia, the Court has been concerned with the risk of the imposition of an arbitrary sentence, rather than the proven fact of one. Furman held that the death penalty "may not be imposed under sentencing procedures that create a substantial risk that the punishment will be inflicted in an arbitrary and capricious manner."  This emphasis on risk acknowledges the difficulty of divining the jury's motivation in an individual case. In addition, it reflects the fact that concern for arbitrariness focuses on the rationality of the system as a whole, and that a system that features a significant probability that sentencing decisions are influenced by impermissible considerations cannot be regarded as rational. As a result, our inquiry under the Eighth Amendment has not been directed to the validity of the individual sentences before us.

Defendants challenging their death sentences thus never have had to prove that impermissible considerations have actually
infected sentencing decisions. We have required instead that they establish that the system under which they were sentenced
posed a significant risk of such an occurrence. McCleskey's claim does differ, however, in one respect from these earlier cases:
it is the first to base a challenge not on speculation about how a system might operate, but on empirical documentation of how it
does operate.

The Court assumes the statistical validity of the Baldus study, and acknowledges that McCleskey has demonstrated a risk that
racial prejudice plays a role in capital sentencing in Georgia. Nonetheless, it finds the probability of prejudice insufficient to create constitutional concern.  Close analysis of the Baldus study, however, in light of both statistical principles and human experience, reveals that the risk that race influenced McCleskey's sentence is intolerable by any imaginable standard.
 

The Baldus study indicates that, after taking into account some 230 nonracial factors that might legitimately influence a
sentencer, the jury more likely than not would have spared McCleskey's life had his victim been black. The study distinguishes
between those cases in which (1) the jury exercises virtually no discretion because the strength or weakness of aggravating
factors usually suggests that only one outcome is appropriate; and (2) cases reflecting an "intermediate" level of aggravation, in
which the jury has considerable discretion in choosing a sentence. McCleskey's case falls into the intermediate range. In such
cases, death is imposed in 34% of white-victim crimes and 14% of black-victim crimes, a difference of 139% in the rate of
imposition of the death penalty. In other words, just under 59% - almost 6 in 10 - defendants comparable to McCleskey would not have received the death penalty if their victims had been black.

Furthermore, even examination of the sentencing system as a whole, factoring in those cases in which the jury exercises little
discretion, indicates the influence of race on capital sentencing. For the Georgia system as a whole, race accounts for a six
percentage point difference in the rate at which capital punishment is imposed. Since death is imposed in 11% of all
white-victim cases, the rate in comparably aggravated black-victim cases is 5%. The rate of capital sentencing in a white-victim
case is thus 120% greater than the rate in a black-victim case. Put another way, over half - 55% - of defendants in white-victim
crimes in Georgia would not have been sentenced to die if their victims had been black. Of the more than 200 variables
potentially relevant to a sentencing decision, race of the victim is a powerful explanation for variation in death sentence rates -
as powerful as nonracial aggravating factors such as a prior murder conviction or acting as the principal planner of the
homicide.

These adjusted figures are only the most conservative indication of the risk that race will influence the death sentences of
defendants in Georgia. Data unadjusted for the mitigating or aggravating effect of other factors show an even more pronounced
disparity by race. The capital sentencing rate for all white-victim cases was almost 11 times greater than the rate for black-victim cases.  Furthermore, blacks who kill whites are sentenced to death at nearly 22 times the rate of blacks who kill blacks, and more than 7 times the rate of whites who kill blacks.  In addition, prosecutors seek the death penalty for 70% of black defendants with white victims, but for only 15% of black defendants with black victims, and only 19% of white defendants with black victims.

The statistical evidence in this case thus relentlessly documents the risk that McCleskey's sentence was influenced by racial
considerations. This evidence shows that there is a better than even chance in Georgia that race will influence the decision to
impose the death penalty: a majority of defendants in white-victim crimes would not have been sentenced to die if their victims
had been black. In determining whether this risk is acceptable, our judgment must be shaped by the awareness that "[t]he risk
of racial prejudice infecting a capital sentencing proceeding is especially serious in light of the complete finality of the death
sentence," and that "[i]t is of vital importance to the defendant and to the community that any decision to impose the death sentence be, and appear to be, based on reason rather than caprice or emotion."  In determining the guilt of a defendant, a State must prove its case beyond a reasonable doubt. That is, we refuse to convict if the chance of error is simply less likely than not. Surely, we should not be willing to take a person's life if the chance that his death sentence was irrationally imposed is more likely than not. In light of the gravity of the interest at stake, petitioner's statistics on their face are a powerful demonstration of the type of risk that our Eighth Amendment jurisprudence has consistently condemned.

                                               C

Evaluation of McCleskey's evidence cannot rest solely on the numbers themselves. We must also ask whether the conclusion
suggested by those numbers is consonant with our understanding of history and human experience. Georgia's legacy of a
race-conscious criminal justice system, as well as this Court's own recognition of the persistent danger that racial attitudes may affect criminal proceedings, indicates that McCleskey's claim is not a fanciful product of mere statistical artifice.

For many years, Georgia operated openly and formally precisely the type of dual system the evidence shows is still effectively in
place. The criminal law expressly differentiated between crimes committed by and against blacks and whites, distinctions whose
lineage traced back to the time of slavery. During the colonial period, black slaves who killed whites in Georgia, regardless of
whether in self-defense or in defense of another, were automatically executed....

In more recent times, some 40 years ago, Gunnar Myrdal's epochal study of American race relations produced findings
mirroring McCleskey's evidence:

     "As long as only Negroes are concerned and no whites are disturbed, great leniency will be shown in most cases . . . .
     The sentences for even major crimes are ordinarily reduced when the victim is another Negro. . . .

     "For offenses which involve any actual or potential danger to whites, however, Negroes are punished more severely than
     whites.

     "On the other hand, it is quite common for a white criminal to be set free if his crime was against a Negro...."

This historical review of Georgia criminal law is not intended as a bill of indictment calling the State to account for past
transgressions. Citation of past practices does not justify the automatic condemnation of current ones. But it would be
unrealistic to ignore the influence of history in assessing the plausible implications of McCleskey's evidence. "[A]mericans share
a historical experience that has resulted in individuals within the culture ubiquitously attaching a significance to race that is
irrational and often outside their awareness."

The majority thus misreads our Eighth Amendment jurisprudence in concluding that McCleskey has not demonstrated a degree
of risk sufficient to raise constitutional concern. The determination of the significance of his evidence is at its core an exercise in
human moral judgment, not a mechanical statistical analysis. It must first and foremost be informed by awareness of the fact that
death is irrevocable, and that as a result "the qualitative difference of death from all other punishments requires a greater degree
of scrutiny of the capital sentencing determination." For this reason, we have demanded a uniquely high degree of rationality in imposing the death penalty. A capital sentencing system in which race more likely than not plays a role does not meet this standard. It is true that every nuance of decision cannot be statistically captured, nor can any individual judgment be plumbed with absolute certainty. Yet the fact that we must always act without the illumination of complete knowledge cannot induce paralysis when we confront what is literally an issue of life and death. Sentencing data, history, and experience all counsel that Georgia has provided insufficient assurance of the heightened rationality we have required in order to take a human life.

                                               IV

The Court cites four reasons for shrinking from the implications of McCleskey's evidence: the desirability of discretion for
actors in the criminal justice system, the existence of statutory safeguards against abuse of that discretion, the potential
consequences for broader challenges to criminal sentencing, and an understanding of the contours of the judicial role. While
these concerns underscore the need for sober deliberation, they do not justify rejecting evidence as convincing as McCleskey
has presented....

Considering the race of a defendant or victim in deciding if the death penalty should be imposed is completely at odds with this
concern that an individual be evaluated as a unique human being. Decisions influenced by race rest in part on a categorical
assessment of the worth of human beings according to color, insensitive to whatever qualities the individuals in question may
possess. Enhanced willingness to impose the death sentence on black defendants, or diminished willingness to render such a
sentence when blacks are victims, reflects a devaluation of the lives of black persons. When confronted with evidence that race
more likely than not plays such a role in a capital sentencing system, it is plainly insufficient to say that the importance of
discretion demands that the risk be higher before we will act - for in such a case the very end that discretion is designed to
serve is being undermined.

Our desire for individualized moral judgments may lead us to accept some inconsistencies in sentencing outcomes. Since such
decisions are not reducible to mathematical formulae, we are willing to assume that a certain degree of variation reflects the fact
that no two defendants are completely alike. There is thus a presumption that actors in the criminal justice system exercise their
discretion in responsible fashion, and we do not automatically infer that sentencing patterns that do not comport with ideal
rationality are suspect.

The Court also maintains that accepting McCleskey's claim would pose a threat to all sentencing because of the prospect that a
correlation might be demonstrated between sentencing outcomes and other personal characteristics. Again, such a view is
indifferent to the considerations that enter into a determination whether punishment is "cruel and unusual." Race is a
consideration whose influence is expressly constitutionally proscribed. We have expressed a moral commitment, as embodied in our fundamental law, that this specific characteristic should not be the basis for allotting burdens and benefits. Three constitutional amendments, and numerous statutes, have been prompted specifically by the desire to address the effects of racism. " That a decision to impose the death penalty could be influenced by race is thus a particularly repugnant prospect,
and evidence that race may play even a modest role in levying a death sentence should be enough to characterize that sentence
as "cruel and unusual...."

The Court's projection of apocalyptic consequences for criminal sentencing is thus greatly exaggerated. The Court can indulge
in such speculation only by ignoring its own jurisprudence demanding the highest scrutiny on issues of death and race. As a
result, it fails to do justice to a claim in which both those elements are intertwined - an occasion calling for the most sensitive
inquiry a court can conduct. Despite its acceptance of the validity of Warren McCleskey's evidence, the Court is willing to let
his death sentence stand because it fears that we cannot successfully define a different standard for lesser punishments. This fear
is baseless.

Finally, the Court justifies its rejection of McCleskey's claim by cautioning against usurpation of the legislatures' role in devising
and monitoring criminal punishment. The Court is, of course, correct to emphasize the gravity of constitutional intervention and
the importance that it be sparingly employed. The fact that "[c]apital punishment is now the law in more than two thirds of our
States,"  however, does not diminish the fact that capital punishment is the most awesome act that a State can perform. The judiciary's role in this society counts for little if the use of governmental power to extinguish life does not elicit close scrutiny. It is true that society has a legitimate interest in punishment. Yet, as Alexander Bickel wrote:  "It is a premise we deduce not merely from the fact of a written constitution but from the history of the race, and ultimately as a moral judgment of the good society, that government should serve not only what we conceive from time to time to be our immediate material needs but also certain enduring values. This in part is what is meant by government under law." The Least Dangerous Branch 24 (1962).

Our commitment to these values requires fidelity to them even when there is temptation to ignore them. Such temptation is
especially apt to arise in criminal matters, for those granted constitutional protection in this context are those whom society finds
most menacing and opprobrious. Even less sympathetic are those we consider for the sentence of death, for execution "is a way
of saying, `You are not fit for this world, take your chance elsewhere.'" For these reasons, "[t]he methods we employ in the enforcement of our criminal law have aptly been called the measures by which the quality of our civilization may be judged."  Those whom we would banish from society or from the human community itself often speak in too faint a voice to be heard above society's demand for punishment. It is the particular role of courts to hear these voices, for the Constitution declares that the majoritarian chorus may not alone dictate the conditions of social life. The Court thus fulfills, rather than disrupts, the scheme of separation of powers by closely scrutinizing the imposition of the death penalty, for no decision of a society is more deserving of "sober second thought."