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S V Makwanyane
''S v Makwanyane and Another'' (CCT 3/94) was a landmark 1995 judgement of the Constitutional Court of South Africa. It established that capital punishment was inconsistent with the commitment to human rights expressed in the Interim Constitution. The court's ruling invalidated section 277(1)(a) of the Criminal Procedure Act 51 of 1977, which had provided for use of the death penalty, along with any similar provisions in any other law in force in South Africa. The court also forbade the government from carrying out the death sentence on any prisoners awaiting execution, ruling that they should remain in prison until new sentences were imposed. Delivered on 6 June, this was the newly established court's "first politically important and publicly controversial holding." Chance The Court held that, in practice, there was an element of chance at every stage of the process of implementing the death penalty: The outcome may be dependent upon factors such as the way the case is inves ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Constitutional Court Of South Africa
The Constitutional Court of South Africa is a supreme court, supreme constitutional court established by the Constitution of South Africa, and is the apex court in the South African judicial system, with general jurisdiction. The Court was first established by the South African Interim Constitution, Interim Constitution of 1993, and its first session began in February 1995. It has continued in existence under the Constitution of South Africa, Constitution of 1996. The Court sits in the city of Johannesburg. After initially occupying commercial offices in Braamfontein, it now sits in a purpose-built complex on Constitution Hill, Johannesburg, Constitution Hill. The first court session in the new complex was held in February 2004. Originally the final appellate court for constitutional matters, since the enactment of the Seventeenth Amendment of the Constitution of South Africa, Seventeenth Amendment of the Constitution in 2013, the Constitutional Court has jurisdiction to hear ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Appellate Division (South Africa)
The Supreme Court of Appeal (SCA), formerly known as the Appellate Division, is an appellate court in South Africa. It is located in Bloemfontein, the "judicial capital" of South Africa. History On the creation of the Union of South Africa from four British colonies in 1910, the supreme courts of the colonies became provincial divisions of the new Supreme Court of South Africa, and the Appellate Division was created as a purely appellate court superior to the provincial divisions. It was the seat of some of the country's most outstanding judges including Innes CJ, Watermeyer CJ, Galgut JA, Wessels CJ and Schreiner JA. In 1994 the Constitutional Court of South Africa was created with jurisdiction superior to the Appellate Division, but it could hear only in constitutional matters. The Appellate Division, therefore, remained the highest court in non-constitutional matters. In 1997 the Appellate Division became the Supreme Court of Appeal and was given constitutional jurisdic ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
1995 In South African Law
File:1995 Events Collage V2.png, From left, clockwise: O.J. Simpson is acquitted of the murders of Nicole Brown Simpson and Ronald Goldman from the year prior in "The Trial of the Century" in the United States; The Great Hanshin earthquake strikes Kobe, Japan, killing 5,000-6,000 people; The Unabomber Manifesto is published in several U.S. newspapers; Gravestone, Gravestones mark the victims of the Srebrenica massacre near the end of the Bosnian War; Windows 95 is launched by Microsoft for Personal computer, PC; The first exoplanet, 51 Pegasi b, is discovered; Space Shuttle Atlantis docks with the Space station Mir in a display of U.S.-Russian cooperation; The Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City is Oklahoma City bombing, bombed by Domestic terrorism in the United States, domestic terrorists, killing 168., 300x300px, thumb rect 0 0 200 200 O. J. Simpson murder case rect 200 0 400 200 Great Hanshin earthquake, Kobe earthquake rect 400 0 600 200 Unabomber Manifesto rect ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Death Penalty Case Law
Death is the irreversible cessation of all biological functions that sustain an organism. For organisms with a brain, death can also be defined as the irreversible cessation of functioning of the whole brain, including brainstem, and brain death is sometimes used as a legal definition of death. The remains of a former organism normally begin to decompose shortly after death. Death is an inevitable process that eventually occurs in almost all organisms. Death is generally applied to whole organisms; the similar process seen in individual components of an organism, such as cells or tissues, is necrosis. Something that is not considered an organism, such as a virus, can be physically destroyed but is not said to die. As of the early 21st century, over 150,000 humans die each day, with ageing being by far the most common cause of death. Many cultures and religions have the idea of an afterlife, and also may hold the idea of judgement of good and bad deeds in one's life (heave ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Constitutional Court Of South Africa Cases
A constitution is the aggregate of fundamental principles or established precedents that constitute the legal basis of a polity, organisation or other type of entity and commonly determine how that entity is to be governed. When these principles are written down into a single document or set of legal documents, those documents may be said to embody a ''written constitution''; if they are encompassed in a single comprehensive document, it is said to embody a ''codified constitution''. The Constitution of the United Kingdom is a notable example of an ''uncodified constitution''; it is instead written in numerous fundamental Acts of a legislature, court cases or treaties. Constitutions concern different levels of organizations, from sovereign countries to companies and unincorporated associations. A treaty which establishes an international organization is also its constitution, in that it would define how that organization is constituted. Within states, a constitution defines ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Mohamed V President Of The Republic Of South Africa
''Mohamed v President of the Republic of South Africa'', 001ZACC 18, is a 2001 decision of the Constitutional Court of South Africa dealing with the legality of the South African government's actions in handing over Khalfan Khamis Mohamed to United States authorities. The court ruled that the South African government may not extradite a suspect who may face the death penalty without seeking an assurance from the receiving country that the suspect will not be sentenced to death. See also * Section Eleven of the Constitution of South Africa * ''S v Makwanyane'' (abolishing the death penalty in South Africa) * ''Soering v United Kingdom'' (similar ruling from the European Court of Human Rights) * '' United States v. Burns'' (similar ruling from the Supreme Court of Canada) References External links Text of the judgmentfrom SAFLII The Southern African Legal Information Institute (SAFLII) is the largest online free-access collection of legislation and case law from South Afri ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Capital Punishment In South Africa
Capital punishment in South Africa was abolished on 6 June 1995 by the ruling of the Constitutional Court in the case of ''S v Makwanyane'', following a five-year and four-month moratorium since February 1990. History The standard method for carrying out executions was hanging, sometimes of several convicts at the same time. Mandatory death penalty for murder was abolished in 1935, comparable to the similar act passed in the United Kingdom in 1957. Before this reform, vast numbers of delinquents were sentenced to death without having their sentences carried out, with only 24% of capital verdicts being carried out in the period 1925 to 1935 (including 7% of verdicts against women). The reform was supported by Prime Minister Jan Smuts, who decried the draconian rates of nominal sentences, favouring greater discretion for judges which were ultimately brought into the penal code with a rule of extenuating circumstances, which largely were maintained into the Criminal Procedure Act, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Parliamentary Sovereignty
Parliamentary sovereignty, also called parliamentary supremacy or legislative supremacy, is a concept in the constitutional law of some parliamentary democracies. It holds that the legislative body has absolute sovereignty and is supreme over all other government institutions, including executive or judicial bodies. It also holds that the legislative body may change or repeal any previous legislation and so it is not bound by written law (in some cases, not even a constitution) or by precedent. In some countries, parliamentary sovereignty may be contrasted with separation of powers, which limits the legislature's scope often to general law-making and makes it subject to external judicial review, where laws passed by the legislature may be declared invalid in certain circumstances. Many states have sovereign legislatures, including the United Kingdom, New Zealand, the Netherlands, Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Barbados, Jamaica, Papua New Guinea, the Solomon Islands, a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Constitutionalism
Constitutionalism is "a compound of ideas, attitudes, and patterns of behavior elaborating the principle that the authority of government derives from and is limited by a body of fundamental law". Political organizations are constitutional to the extent that they "contain institutionalized mechanisms of power control for the protection of the interests and liberties of the citizenry, including those that may be in the minority". As described by political scientist and constitutional scholar David Fellman: Definition Constitutionalism has prescriptive and descriptive uses. Law professor Gerhard Casper captured this aspect of the term in noting, "Constitutionalism has both descriptive and prescriptive connotations. Used descriptively, it refers chiefly to the historical struggle for constitutional recognition of the people's right to 'consent' and certain other rights, freedoms, and privileges. Used prescriptively, its meaning incorporates those features of government s ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Landmark Decision
Landmark court decisions, in present-day common law legal systems, establish precedents that determine a significant new legal principle or concept, or otherwise substantially affect the interpretation of existing law. "Leading case" is commonly used in the United Kingdom and other Commonwealth jurisdictions instead of "landmark case", as used in the United States. In Commonwealth countries, a reported decision is said to be a ''leading decision'' when it has come to be generally regarded as settling the law of the question involved. In 1914, Canadian jurist A. H. F. Lefroy, Augustus Henry Frazer Lefroy said "a 'leading case' [is] one that settles the law upon some important point". A leading decision may settle the law in more than one way. It may do so by: * Distinguishing a new principle that refines a prior principle, thus departing from prior practice without violating the rule of ''stare decisis''; * Establishing a "test" (that is, a measurable standard that can be applied ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Constitutional Law
Constitutional law is a body of law which defines the role, powers, and structure of different entities within a State (polity), state, namely, the executive (government), executive, the parliament or legislature, and the judiciary; as well as the basic rights of citizens and, in federal countries History of the United States Constitution, such as the United States and Provinces of Canada, Canada, the relationship between the central government and state, provincial, or territorial governments. Not all nation states have codified constitutions, though all such states have a ''jus commune'', or law of the land, that may consist of a variety of imperative and consensual rules. These may include custom (law), customary law, Convention (norm), conventions, statutory law, precedent, judge-made law, or international law, international rules and norms. Constitutional law deals with the fundamental principles by which the government exercises its authority. In some instances, these princi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
South African Constitution Of 1993
The Interim Constitution was the fundamental law of South Africa from the first non-racial general election on 27 April 1994 until it was superseded by the final constitution on 4 February 1997. As a transitional constitution it required the newly elected Parliament to also serve as a constituent assembly to adopt a final constitution. It made provision for a major restructuring of government as a consequence of the abolition of apartheid. It also introduced an entrenched bill of rights against which legislation and government action could be tested, and created the Constitutional Court with broad powers of judicial review. History An integral part of the negotiations to end apartheid in South Africa was the creation of a new, non-discriminatory constitution for the country. One of the major disputed issues was the process by which such a constitution would be adopted. The African National Congress (ANC) insisted that it should be drawn up by a democratically elected consti ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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