Opinion ID: 2367165
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: IIB VALIDITY OF SENTENCE ÔÇö CONSTITUTIONAL ARGUMENTS

Text: It should be apparent that the latest version of the Sentencing Code has responded to the announcements of this Court, Commonwealth v. Moody, 476 Pa. 223, 382 A.2d 442 (1977) and of the United States Supreme Court, Lockett v. Ohio, 438 U.S. 586, 98 S.Ct. 2954, 57 L.Ed.2d 973 (1978). The constitutional deficiencies identified in those cases was the failure to permit the jury to consider a sufficiently broad spectrum of circumstances relating to the character of the offender, as well as to the circumstances of the offense. The legislature has now cured this deficiency in providing that the jury can consider a wide range of seven specific mitigating circumstances (set forth at note 13, supra ), as well as [a]ny other evidence of mitigation concerning the character and record of the defendant and the circumstances of his offense. 42 Pa.C.S.A.  9711(e)(8). Nevertheless, appellant and amici curiae [24] assert that the Sentencing Code falls short of the constitutional mark in several aspects. Preliminarily, we must reiterate that perfection is not required, nor is it possible ÔÇö there is no perfect procedure for deciding in which cases governmental authority should be used to impose a sentence of death. Lockett v. Ohio, supra at 605, 98 S.Ct. at 2965. The requirement that the jury must be allowed to consider whatever mitigating evidence relevant to his character and evidence the defendant can present, Commonwealth v. Moody, supra 476 Pa. at 237, 382 A.2d at 449, mandates that a certain amount of flexibility be built into any capital punishment sentencing structure, and moreover, virtually assures some imperfection in sentencing. Yet this requisite degree of flexibility is compatible with the federal and state constitutions if procedures exist which serve to focus the jury's attention on the particularized nature of the crime and the particularized characteristics of the offender, thus channeling the jury's discretion in order to ensure that, with the assistance of appellate scrutiny, the death sentence has not been imposed in an arbitrary and capricious manner. Gregg v. Georgia, supra 428 U.S. at 206-07, 96 S.Ct. at 2940-2941 (Stewart, J., Opinion announcing the judgment of the Court); Lockett v. Ohio, supra 438 U.S. at 601, 98 S.Ct. at 2963 (it is not required that all sentencing discretion be eliminated, but only that it be directed and limited so that the death penalty will be imposed in a more consistent and rational manner and so that there will exist a meaningful basis for distinguishing the cases in which it is imposed from those in which it is not.) Furthermore, in assessing the validity of the Sentencing Code we must remain mindful of another extremely important consideration, namely that: it is the legislature which has adopted the death penalty as a possible sentence for murder of the first degree in Pennsylvania. In considering such an emotionally charged, controversial and polarizing issue such as the death penalty, the legislature is peculiarly well-adapted to respond to the consensus of the people of this Commonwealth. Regardless of the personal beliefs of any member of this Court, it is manifestly not our function or prerogative to perform as a super-legislature and disturb the determination of the General Assembly absent a demonstration that the legislative enactment  clearly, palpably and plainly violates some specific mandate or prohibition of the constitution. Snider v. Thornburgh, 496 Pa. 159 at 166, 436 A.2d 593 at 596 (1981), citing Tosto v. Pennsylvania Nursing Home Loan Agency, 460 Pa. 1, 331 A.2d 198 (1975). In Snider v. Thornburgh, supra , this Court identified what is perhaps the most fundamental principle of statutory construction: the presumption that the legislature has acted constitutionally. This presumption `reflects on the part of the judiciary the respect due to the legislature as a co-equal branch of the government.' School District of Deer Lakes v. Kane, 463 Pa. 554, 562, 345 A.2d 658, 662 (1971). 496 Pa. at 159, 436 A.2d at 596. So too, in Gregg v. Georgia, supra 428 U.S. at 174-76, 96 S.Ct. at 2925-26, the United States Supreme Court instructed: But, while we have an obligation to insure that constitutional bounds are not overreached, we may not act as judges as we might as legislators. Courts are not representative bodies. They are not designed to be a good reflex of a democratic society. Their judgment is best informed, and therefore most dependable, within narrow limits. The essential quality is detachment, founded on independence. History teaches that the independence of the judiciary is jeopardized when courts become embroiled in the passions of the day and assume primary responsibility in choosing between competing political, economic and social pressures. Dennis v. United States, 341 U.S. 494, 525, 71 S.Ct. 857, 875, 95 L.Ed. 1137 (1951) (Frankfurter, J., concurring in affirmance of judgment). Therefore, in assessing a punishment selected by a democratically elected legislature against the constitutional measure, we presume its validity. We may not require the legislature to select the least severe penalty possible so long as the penalty selected is not cruelly inhumane or disproportionate to the crime involved. And a heavy burden rests on those who would attack the judgment of the representatives of the people. This is true in part because the constitutional test is intertwined with an assessment of contemporary standards and the legislative judgment weighs heavily in ascertaining such standards. [I]n a democratic society legislatures, not courts, are constituted to respond to the will and consequently the moral values of the people. Furman v. Georgia, supra, 408 U.S., at 383, 92 S.Ct., at 2800 (Burger, C.J., dissenting). Accordingly, this Court is constrained from interference with the legislative judgment that the crime of murder of the first degree, coupled with specific aggravating circumstances, is a heinous enough act to warrant imposition of the death penalty under carefully drafted sentencing procedures, unless appellant can meet his heavy burden of demonstrating the unconstitutionality of 18 Pa.C.S.A.  1311 [transferred to 42 Pa.C.S.A.  9711: see note 11, supra ] in some particular. Commonwealth v. Story, supra 497 Pa. 273 at 297-98, 440 A.2d 488 at 500-01 (Larsen, J., dissenting, joined by Flaherty and Kauffman, JJ.) With these principles to guide us, we proceed to the specific allegations of unconstitutionality. Appellant and amici argue vigorously that the statutory provisions for appellate review are inadequate to ensure that the jury's discretion has been channelled so as to prevent the arbitrary and capricious imposition of the death penalty. We cannot accept this proposition. It is certain that the United States Supreme Court considers meaningful appellate review by a court having statewide jurisdiction to be at least a very important factor (perhaps a sine qua non ) in a constitutionally permissible legislative scheme for imposition of the death penalty, because such review is, in effect, a last line of defense to guard against arbitrary sentencing by a jury. [25] However, the United States Supreme Court has also made it clear that no particular mechanism of appellate review is required, and has never struck down a state's capital punishment scheme on the basis that the review by the state appellate courts was inadequate, choosing to assume, in the absence of evidence to the contrary, that the state courts would properly fulfill their obligations to ensure against arbitrary and capricious imposition of the death penalty. It is true, as appellant and amici point out, that the elaborate administrative procedures provided by statute in Georgia to facilitate and expedite appellate review by the Supreme Court of Georgia [26] were well received by the United States Supreme Court in Gregg v. Georgia, supra . The suggestion that such mechanisms are constitutionally required, however, flies in the face of the latter Court's explicit pronouncement in Proffitt v. Florida, supra . In Proffitt, the petitioner had asserted that the rather general provision for appellate review under the Florida statute was subjective and unpredictable, and therefore unconstitutional. The statute, Fla.Stat.Ann.  921.141 Crim. Proc. & Corrections, provides only that the judgment of conviction and sentence of death shall be subject to automatic and expedited review by the Supreme Court of Florida. While the statute did not so provide, the Florida high court nevertheless undertook the task of reviewing each death sentence to ensure that similar results were reached in similar cases. State v. Dixon, 283 So.2d 1, 10 (Fla.Sup.Ct. 1973). The United States Supreme Court rejected petitioner's argument, holding: While it may be true that [the Florida Supreme Court] has not chosen to formulate a rigid objective test as its standard of review for all cases, it does not follow that the appellate review process is ineffective or arbitrary. In fact, it is apparent that the Florida court has undertaken responsibly to perform its function of death sentence review with a maximum of rationality and consistency. For example, it has several times compared the circumstances of a case under review with those of previous cases in which it has assesed the imposition of death sentences. See, e.g., Alford v. State, 307 So.2d [433], at 445; Alvord v. State, 322 So.2d, [533] at 540-541. By following this procedure the Florida court has in effect adopted the type of proportionality review mandated by the Georgia statute. Proffitt v. Florida, supra 428 U.S. at 258-59, 96 S.Ct. at 2969-2970. And, in Jurek v. Texas, supra 428 U.S. at 276, 96 S.Ct. at 2958 the Court stated: By providing prompt judicial review of the jury's decision in a court with statewide jurisdiction, Texas has provided a means to promote the evenhanded, rational and consistent imposition of death sentences under law. (Opinion by Stewart, J., announcing the judgment of the Court). Texas merely provided, as did Florida, that the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals shall automatically and expeditiously review the conviction and sentence of death, Tex.Code Crim.Proc. Art. 37.071(f), and provided no substantive guidelines nor procedural mechanisms for appellate review. The United States Supreme Court presumed that the Texas court would adequately perform its statutory and constitutional obligations. Id. at 279, 96 S.Ct. at 2959 (White, J., concurring). From the foregoing, it is clear that so long as an appellate court of statewide jurisdiction will conduct a meaningful review of a sentence of death to guard against its arbitrary and capricious imposition, the United States Supreme Court will not interfere with the state's choice of appellate and administrative mechanisms. (On March 21, 1983, certiorari was granted by the United States Supreme Court in the case of Pulley v. Harris, 82-1095, 32 Cr.L. 2050 (9th Cir.). This case presents the opportunity for that Court to delineate the exact parameters of the constitutional requirements for appellate review of death penalty cases, specifically whether any particular form of proportionality review by a court of statewide jurisdiction is required and, if so, the focus, scope and procedural structure of such review. 32 Cr.L. 4229.) This Court does not treat lightly its statutory and constitutional duties and will conduct an independent evaluation of all cases decided since the effective date of the sentencing procedures under consideration (September 13, 1978). This independent review mandated by 42 Pa.C.S.A.  9711(h)(3)(iii) will utilize all available judicial resources and will encompass all similar cases, taking into consideration both the circumstances of the crime and the character and record of the defendant in order to determine whether the sentence of death is excessive or disproportionate to the circumstances. Our review indicates that, as would be expected with an aggravating circumstance as specific as  9711(d)(5), the first degree murder cases involving the killing of a prosecution witness to a murder or other felony are infrequent. The only case that our research indicates has proceeded to a jury verdict under  9711(d)(5) of the Act of September 13, 1978, has also resulted in a sentence of death. [26a] We find, therefore, that in Pennsylvania, the sentence of death for murder of the first degree involving the aggravating circumstance of killing a prosecution witness to a murder or other felony is not excessive or disproportionate to the sentence imposed in similar cases. Appellant makes a related argument that, because the jury is not required to indicate, in writing or otherwise, the mitigating circumstances that it finds to exist, this Court will not be able to properly perform its appellate duties. Such argument assumes that this Court is not able to review the record of the trial and sentencing proceedings, which is assuredly not the case. We have reviewed in this case, as we will in the future, the entire record and will evaluate similar cases on the basis of the evidence presented as to mitigating circumstances. Thus, the lower court did not abuse its discretion in refusing defense counsel's request to poll the jury as to which mitigating circumstances it found. It is next argued that section 9711 of the Sentencing Code improperly allocates the burden of proof by placing the risk of non-persuasion on the defendant, who is required to convince the jury that mitigating circumstances exist by a preponderance of the evidence. Subsection (c)(iii) provides that aggravating circumstances must be proved by the Commonwealth beyond a reasonable doubt and that mitigating circumstances be proved by the defendant by a preponderance. Appellant and amici suggest that this allocation violates the due process protections of the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments to the United States Constitution which protect the accused against conviction except upon proof beyond a reasonable doubt of every fact necessary to constitute the crime with which he is charged. In re Winship, 397 U.S. 358, 364, 90 S.Ct. 1068, 1072, 25 L.Ed.2d 368 (1970). This suggestion is unfounded, as is made evident by Patterson v. New York, 432 U.S. 197, 97 S.Ct. 2319, 53 L.Ed.2d 281 (1977), a case which is conspicuous by its absence from the briefs of appellant or amici. In Patterson, the United States Supreme Court held it proper to place, even at the guilt stage, the burden of proving an affirmative defense upon a defendant (specifically in that case, the defense of extreme emotional disturbance). That Court held, at 205-06, 97 S.Ct. at 2324-2325: We cannot conclude that Patterson's conviction under the New York law deprived him of due process of law. The crime of murder is defined by the statute, which represents a recent revision of the state criminal code, as causing the death of another person with intent to do so. The death, the intent to kill, and causation are the facts that the State is required to prove beyond a reasonable doubt if a person is to be convicted of murder. No further facts are either presumed or inferred in order to constitute the crime. The statute does provide an affirmative defense ÔÇö that the defendant acted under the influence of extreme emotional disturbance for which there was a reasonable explanation ÔÇö which, if proved by a preponderance of the evidence, would reduce the crime to manslaughter, an offense defined in a separate section of the statute. It is plain enough that if the intentional killing is shown, the State intends to deal with the defendant as a murderer unless he demonstrates the mitigating circumstances. Here, the jury was instructed in accordance with the statute, and the guilty verdict confirms that the State successfully carried its burden of proving the facts of the crime beyond a reasonable doubt. Nothing in the evidence, including any evidence that might have been offered with respect to Patterson's mental state at the time of the crime, raised a reasonable doubt about his guilt as a murderer; and clearly the evidence failed to convince the jury that Patterson's affirmative defense had been made out. It seems to us that the State satisfied the mandate of Winship that it prove beyond a reasonable doubt every fact necessary to constitute the crime with which [Patterson was] charged. 397 U.S., at 364, 90 S.Ct., at 1073. Other decisions of that Court, and of this, have expressed approval of legislative schemes placing the burden of proving mitigating circumstances on a defendant. See Proffitt v. Florida, supra and Commonwealth v. Moody, 476 Pa. at 237, 382 A.2d at 449 ([I]n our view, in order to protect a defendant from cruel and unusual punishment in a capital case, it is now necessary both that the aggravating circumstances that will justify the imposition of the death penalty be clearly defined . . . and that the sentencing authority be allowed to consider whatever mitigating evidence relevant to his character and record the defendant can present. ) Under 42 Pa.C.S.A.  9711(c), the Commonwealth, by proving guilt beyond a reasonable doubt of murder of the first degree and of the existence of one or more aggravating circumstances, has demonstrated all that is constitutionally required of it. In meeting this burden, the Commonwealth must prove every element necessary to establish murder of the first degree and every element necessary to establish one or more aggravating circumstance which the legislature has determined is of a sufficiently heinous nature as to require imposition of the death penalty. The accused is then given the opportunity to prove, by a preponderance of the evidence, that there are mitigating circumstances that might convince a jury that the sentence should nevertheless be set at life imprisonment. Such an allocation is not offensive to due process. It is further contended that the Sentencing Code is unconstitutional because it supplies no fixed burden of proof as to the weighing of aggravating circumstances against mitigating circumstances, and that the standards are, therefore, impermissibly vague. Appellant and amici would have us invalidate this procedure because the Sentencing Code fails to instruct the jury that the aggravating circumstances must outweigh the mitigating circumstances beyond a reasonable doubt or, alternatively, by some lesser articulated standard which would inform the jury as to what extent the aggravating circumstances must outweigh the mitigating. For the reasons stated in the preceding section regarding allocations of burdens of proof, we are not persuaded by this contention. The jury is simply asked to determine whether aggravating circumstances outweigh mitigating. 42 Pa.C.S.A.  9711(c)(iv). Such a standard is not vague. Appellant would prefer a stricter weighing standard but, as we have seen, the Commonwealth has the burden of proving beyond a reasonable doubt every element of the offense and of the aggravating circumstances required to sustain a death sentence, and this Court is not at liberty to tamper with the constitutionally permissible legislative judgment regarding that weighing process. The United States Supreme Court rejected a similar contention in Proffitt v. Florida, supra 428 U.S. at 257-58, 96 S.Ct. at 2968-2969: In a similar vein the petitioner argues that it is not possible to make a rational determination whether there are sufficient aggravating circumstances that are not outweighed by the mitigating circumstances, since the state law assigns no specific weight to any of the various circumstances to be considered. See  921.141 (Supp. 1976-1977). While these questions and decisions may be hard, they require no more line drawing than is commonly required of a factfinder in a lawsuit. For example, juries have traditionally evaluated the validity of defenses such as insanity or reduced capacity, both of which involve the same considerations as some of the above-mentioned mitigating circumstances. While the various factors to be considered by the sentencing authorities do not have numerical weights assigned to them, the requirements of Furman are satisfied when the sentencing authority's discretion is guided and channeled by requiring examination of specific factors that argue in favor of or against imposition of the death penalty, thus eliminating total arbitrariness and capriciousness in its imposition. The directions given to judge and jury by the Florida statute are sufficiently clear and precise to enable the various aggravating circumstances to be weighed against the mitigating ones. As a result, the trial court's sentencing discretion is guided and channeled by a system that focuses on the circumstances of each individual homicide and individual defendant in deciding whether the death penalty is to be imposed. Amici, NAACP, argues that another facet of Pennsylvania criminal jurisprudence, namely the practice of instructing the jury in a homicide trial on the elements of the offense of voluntary manslaughter, upon request, whether or not evidence exists to support such a charge, see e.g., Commonwealth v. Jones, 457 Pa. 563, 319 A.2d 142 (1974), cert. denied 419 U.S. 100, 95 S.Ct. 316, 42 L.Ed.2d 274 (1974) and Commonwealth v. Harris, 472 Pa. 406, 372 A.2d 757 (1977), invites the jury to disregard their oaths to apply the law to the evidence and, therefore, encourages arbitrary and capricious sentencing in homicide cases in violation of the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments as interpreted in Roberts v. Louisiana, 428 U.S. 325, 96 S.Ct. 3001, 49 L.Ed.2d 974 (1976), one of the 1976 quintet of death penalty cases. [27] (In the instant case, no request for voluntary manslaughter instructions were made, as such instructions would have been incompatible with the defense offered, since it admitted liability for either murder of the first or murder of the third degree). The evil addressed in Furman and in Bradley was that the death penalty practices and procedures then in effect failed to adequately channel a jury's discretion and, thus, allowed for arbitrary and capricious sentences of death which failed to reveal why the death penalty was imposed in some (few) cases but not in other, similar, instances. Amici relies on Roberts to support its proposition that the Pennsylvania practice on voluntary manslaughter instructions continues to invite jury arbitrariness in sentencing despite the elaborate provisions of 42 Pa.C.S.A.  9711. In Roberts, the United States Supreme Court considered Louisiana's unique system of responsive verdicts, supra at 332, 96 S.Ct. at 3005, wherein the jury, in every first-degree murder case, is instructed on the crimes of first-degree murder, second-degree murder, and manslaughter, whether or not there is any evidence adduced at trial to support a verdict of voluntary manslaughter, and held: Louisiana's mandatory death sentence statute also fails to comply with Furman's requirement that standardless jury discretion be replaced by procedures that safeguard against the arbitrary and capricious imposition of death sentences. The State claims that it has adopted satisfactory procedures by taking all sentencing authority from juries in capital murder cases. This was accomplished, according to the State, by deleting the jury's pre- Furman authority to return a verdict of guilty without capital punishment in any murder case. See La.Rev.Stat.Ann.  14:30 (1974); La.Code Crim.Proc.Ann., Arts. 814, 817 (Supp.1975). Under the current Louisiana system, however, every jury in a first-degree murder case is instructed on the crimes of second-degree murder and manslaughter and permitted to consider those verdicts even if there is not a scintilla of evidence to support the lesser verdicts. See La.Code Crim.Proc.Ann., Arts. 809, 814 (Supp.1975). And, if a lesser verdict is returned, it is treated as an acquittal of all greater charges. See La.Code Crim.Proc. Ann., Art. 598 (Supp.1975). This responsive verdict procedure not only lacks standards to guide the jury in selecting among first-degree murderers, but it plainly invites the jurors to disregard their oaths and choose a verdict for a lesser offense whenever they feel the death penalty is inappropriate. There is an element of capriciousness in making the jurors' power to avoid the death penalty dependent on their willingness to accept this invitation to disregard the trial judge's instructions. The Louisiana procedure neither provides standards to channel jury judgments nor permits review to check the arbitrary exercise of the capital jury's de facto sentencing discretion. See Woodson v. North Carolina , 428 U.S., [280] at 302-303, 96 S.Ct., [2978] at 2990-2991. Id. 428 U.S. at 334-35, 96 S.Ct. at 3006-3007. It seems that the Court was influenced in its decision by a combination of factors: the mandatory verdict of death for first-degree murder, the unfettered discretion of the jury to return a lesser offense, coupled with the facts that, in Louisiana, there are no standards provided to guide the jury in the exercise of its power to select those first-degree murderers who will receive death sentences, and there is no meaningful appellate review of the jury's decision. Id. at 335-36, 96 S.Ct. at 3007. Mr. Justice White dissented in Roberts, joined by the Chief Justice, Mr. Justice Blackmun and Mr. Justice Rehnquist. The dissenters would have found the Louisiana responsive verdict system valid because the jury was not instructed that it could in its discretion convict of a lesser included offense. Rather, they were simply given the various instructions so that, if they did not believe beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendant was guilty of first degree murder, they were free to consider the lesser verdicts. Id. at 347, 96 S.Ct. at 3012. That the combination of factors ÔÇö mandatory death sentences for first degree murder, charging on lesser included offenses, lack of sentencing standards/guidelines, and lack of meaningful appellate review ÔÇö produced the unconstitutional result in Louisiana is apparent from the companion cases of Gregg v. Georgia, supra , Proffitt v. Florida, supra , and Jurek v. Texas, supra . In each of those cases, the petitioners had argued that discretionary aspects of the states' criminal justice system, including prosecutorial discretion in charging, plea bargaining, executive clemency and the practice of charging the jury on lesser included offenses, presented the potential evil of arbitrary and capricious decision-making which was condemned in Furman and Bradley. As Mr. Justice White stated, such a contention seems to be in the final analysis an indictment of our entire system of justice, Gregg v. Georgia, supra 428 U.S. at 225-26, 96 S.Ct. at 2949-2950 (White, J., concurring, joined by the Chief Justice and Rehnquist, J.), and was unacceptable. Id. The opinion of Mr. Justice Stewart stated: First, the petitioner focuses on the opportunities for discretionary action that are inherent in the processing of any murder case under Georgia law. He notes that the state prosecutor has unfettered authority to select those persons whom he wishes to prosecute for a capital offense and to plea bargain with them. Further, at the trial the jury may choose to convict a defendant of a lesser included offense rather than find him guilty of a crime punishable by death, even if the evidence would support a capital verdict. And finally, a defendant who is convicted and sentenced to die may have his sentence commuted by the Governor of the State and the Georgia Board of Pardons and Paroles. The existence of these discretionary stages is not determinative of the issues before us. At each of these stages an actor in the criminal justice system makes a decision which may remove a defendant from consideration as a candidate for the death penalty. Furman, in contrast, dealt with the decision to impose the death sentence on a specific individual who had been convicted of a capital offense. Nothing in any of our cases suggests that the decision to afford an individual defendant mercy violates the Constitution. Furman held only that, in order to minimize the risk that the death penalty would be imposed on a capriciously selected group of offenders, the decision to impose it had to be guided by standards so that the sentencing authority would focus on the particularized circumstances of the crime and the defendant. Id. 428 U.S. at 199, 96 S.Ct. at 2937. (Opinion of Stewart, J., announcing the judgment of the Court, joined by Powell and Stevens, JJ.) The sentencing procedures in Pennsylvania more closely approximate the Georgia, Florida and Texas procedures than those of Louisiana. Juries in Pennsylvania are not mandated to impose the death penalty in all cases of murder of the first degree, and are not left without guidelines in the determination of whether to impose death or life imprisonment. Perhaps the most significant difference between this Commonwealth and Louisiana is this state's provisions for meaningful appellate review for excessiveness and disproportionality in similar cases. In the instant proceeding, our review of similar cases does not encompass those cases where a defendant requested, or might have requested, a charge on voluntary manslaughter. Appellant herein admitted criminal liability for either murder of the first or murder of the third degree. His defense specifically eschewed any possibility of an instruction on any lesser offense. It would be inappropriate, therefore, to include cases in the comparison wherein the jury was instructed on voluntary manslaughter in the absence of evidence to support such verdict. Accordingly, we need not decide whether, in an appropriate case, the Pennsylvania practice (of charging the jury on voluntary manslaughter, upon request, where there is no evidence to support such a verdict) leads to arbitrary and capricious results, or presents a substantial possibility of arbitrariness. Recent decisions of this Court have indicated an erosion of the rule expressed in Commonwealth v. Jones, supra , see, e.g., Commonwealth v. Manning, 477 Pa. 495, 384 A.2d 1197 (1978) (dissenting opinion by Nix, J., author of opinion in support of affirmance in Jones ), and a recognition, although belated, that permitting the jury to consider a verdict where no evidence exists to support it invites arbitrariness. Id., and see Commonwealth v. Milton, 491 Pa. 614, 421 A.2d 1054 (1980). It is indeed ironic that the Jones rule (on voluntary manslaughter instructions) is now alleged to create a possibility of arbitrariness, since the rule was adopted, in large part, because of a perceived potential for arbitrariness in reposing in the trial judge the discretion whether to so charge. See Commonwealth v. Jones, 457 Pa. at 578, 319 A.2d 142 (Roberts, J., opinion in support of affirmance: [b]ecause the choice whether or not to charge [on voluntary manslaughter] is discretionary with the trial judge, and he has been furnished with no objective standards for his guidance, the challenged practice offends due process. . . .). Contrary to the opinions of two Justices, Commonwealth v. Schaller, 493 Pa. 426, 435 n. 11, 426 A.2d 1090, 1095 n. 11 (1981), the Jones rule is clearly not required by the Constitution. In Schaller, the opinion announcing the result of the Court viewed Beck v. Alabama, 447 U.S. 625, 100 S.Ct. 2382, 65 L.Ed.2d 392 (1980) as requiring a charge on voluntary manslaughter in all cases despite the nature of the evidence. This viewpoint was laid to rest by Hopper v. Evans, 456 U.S. 605, 102 S.Ct. 2049, 72 L.Ed.2d 367 (1982) wherein the United States Supreme Court stated: The Court of Appeals misread our opinion in Beck. . . . [D]ue process requires that a lesser included offense instruction be given only when the evidence warrants such an instruction. The jury's discretion is thus channelled so that it may convict a defendant of any crime fairly supported by the evidence. At 611, 102 S.Ct at 2053. The Court in Hopper further, contrasted Roberts v. Louisiana, supra interpreting that case as suggest[ing] that an instruction on a lesser offense . . . would have been impermissible absent evidence supporting a conviction of a lesser offense. Id. Thus, any lingering notion that the Jones rule had constitutional underpinnings has been finally dispelled. See Commonwealth v. Jones, supra (opinion by Nix, J., in support of affirmance, premising the rule on this Court's supervisory powers). In a related development, this Court has rejected the practice of charging the jury, on request, on the crime of involuntary manslaughter without regard to the evidence, holding that charging the jury on extraneous offenses in homicide trials would be inapposite and detrimental to the sound administration of justice. Commonwealth v. White, 490 Pa. 179, 184, 415 A.2d 399, 401 (1980), and Commonwealth v. Williams, 490 Pa. 187, 415 A.2d 403 (1980). In an appropriate case, this Court would have to consider whether Roberts v. Louisiana, supra , would require a similar result regarding instructions on voluntary manslaughter in the absence of evidence to support such an offense. Finally, appellant and amici argue that the imposition of the death penalty is inevitably cruel punishment under Article I,  13 of the Pennsylvania Constitution which provides: Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel punishment inflicted. The argument that capital punishment inevitably violates the prohibition of the Eighth Amendment against cruel and unusual punishments has, of course, been foreclosed by the United States Supreme Court. See Gregg v. Georgia, supra 428 U.S. at 169, 187, 96 S.Ct. at 2923, 2931. It is requested, however, that this Court interpret Art. I,  13 as providing broader protection than that guaranteed by the cruel and unusual punishment clause of the United States Constitution. We decline the invitation, and hold that the rights secured by the Pennsylvania prohibition against cruel punishments are co-extensive with those secured by the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments. It is undisputed that the framers of the United States Constitution did not consider the death penalty to be a per se violation of the prohibition against cruel punishments. See Gregg v. Georgia, supra at 177, 96 S.Ct. at 2927. [28] Neither did the framers of the Pennsylvania Constitution. Article I,  9 enacted simultaneously with Art. I,  13, provides nor can [the accused in a criminal prosecution] be deprived of his life, liberty, or property, unless by the judgment of his peers or the law of the land. Similarly, Art. I,  10 provides [n]o person shall, for the same offense, be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb . . .. We accept the principle enunciated by the United States Supreme Court that the intention of the framers is not the end point of our analysis, for the Pennsylvania prohibition against cruel punishment, like its federal counterpart against cruel and unusual punishment, is not a static concept. As Mr. Chief Justice Warren said, in an oft-quoted phrase, `[t]he [Eighth] Amendment must draw its meaning from the evolving standards of decency that mark the progress of a maturing society.' Gregg v. Georgia, supra at 173, 96 S.Ct. at 2925, quoting Trop v. Dulles, 356 U.S. 86, 101, 78 S.Ct. 590, 598, 2 L.Ed.2d 630 (1958) (plurality opinion). We believe that the most accurate indicators of those evolving standards of decency are the enactments of the elected representatives of the people in the legislature. What was stated earlier bears repeating at this juncture: In considering such an emotionally charged, controversial and polarizing issue such as the death penalty, the legislature is peculiarly well-adapted to respond to the consensus of the people of this Commonwealth. Commonwealth v. Story, supra 497 Pa. at 297, 440 A.2d at 500 (Larsen, J., dissenting). [T]he constitutional test is intertwined with an assessment of contemporary standards and the legislative judgment weighs heavily in ascertaining such standards. [I]n a democratic society legislatures, not courts, are constituted to respond to the will and consequently the moral values of the people. Gregg v. Georgia, supra 428 U.S. at 175-76, 96 S.Ct. at 2926-2927, quoting Furman v. Georgia, supra, 408 U.S. at 383, 92 S.Ct. at 2800. The General Assembly of this Commonwealth has, since its inception, consistently and continually expressed its conviction that the death penalty is, for at least some intentional killings, an appropriate and necessary form of punishment. When the charter was granted William Penn by Charles II in 1681, Penn quickly exercised the privilege granted thereunder to enact laws, and passed statutes in 1682 and 1683 prescribing penalties less than death for all offenses except willful or premeditated murder. [29] (Prior to that time, the death penalty was a permissible punishment for a variety of felonies). Even under the so-called humane laws of William Penn, therefore, capital punishment was accepted as a necessary and appropriate punishment for willful and premeditated killings. Keedy, History of the Pennsylvania Statute Creating Degrees of Murder, 97 U.Pa. L.Rev. 759, 763 (1949) (hereinafter cited as Keedy). Immediately upon Penn's death in 1718, the Provincial Assembly repealed these humane laws and prescribed the death penalty for, inter alia, sodomy, buggery, rape, highway robbery, witchcraft and enchantment. These and other subsequently added offenses, continued to be classified as capital until near the end of the century. Id. at 763-64. In 1794, the General Assembly approved an act, the first of its kind among the states, creating degrees of murder with the death penalty confined to murder of the first degree encompassing all willful, deliberate and premeditated killings Keedy, supra at 772-73; Woodson v. North Carolina, supra 428 U.S. at 290, 96 S.Ct. at 2984. [30] From that time until the present, this Commonwealth has always operated under some legislative enactment setting the penalty for at least some first degree murders at death, except for brief periods caused by decisions of this Court in Commonwealth v. Bradley, supra , Commonwealth v. Moody, supra , and Commonwealth v. McKenna, supra . The legislature has always acted promptly to fill the gaps caused by those decisions. See Commonwealth v. McKenna, supra 476 Pa. at 435, 383 A.2d 174. Moreover, the legislatures of 34 other states were quick to act in response to Furman, and have also concluded that capital punishment is appropriate for at least some crimes that result in the death of another person. Gregg v. Georgia, supra, 428 U.S. at 179, 96 S.Ct. at 2928. Combining present acceptance with past usage, Trop v. Dulles, supra 356 U.S. at 99, 78 S.Ct. at 597, opined the death penalty has been observed throughout our history, and, in a day when it is still widely accepted, it cannot be said to violate the constitutional concept of cruelty. The finding that the death penalty is not per se cruel punishment under Article I,  13 is implicit in many of our prior decisions. See, e.g., Commonwealth v. Green, 396 Pa. 137, 151 A.2d 241 (1959) (death penalty not cruel and unusual punishment under either state or federal constitutions simply because applied to 15 year old defendant, although sentence reduced because lower court failed to consider particularized factors relating to the individual, not from a disinclination against capital punishment) and Commonwealth v. Howard, 426 Pa. 305, 231 A.2d 860 (1967) (death penalty not cruel and unusual punishment under either state or federal constitutions merely because defendant had been classified as mentally ill with borderline or transient psychosis). [31] For the foregoing reasons, we hold that the death penalty is not cruel punishment within the proscription of Art. I,  13 of the Pennsylvania Constitution, and, further, that the sentencing procedures adopted by the General Assembly and set forth at section 9711 of the Sentencing Code, 42 Pa.C. S.A.  9711, are permissible under the Constitutions of this state and of the United States. Accordingly, we sustain the conviction of murder of the first degree and affirm the sentence of death. [32] It is so ordered. ROBERTS, J., files a dissenting opinion in which O'BRIEN, C.J., joins. NIX, J., files a dissenting opinion.