The Supreme Court has just ruled that executing the retarded violates the Constitution and that capital sentencing must be carried out by juries, not judges.

The prosecution counters that the evidence shouldn't be admitted, but under the relaxed standards for mitigating evidence during capital sentencing, it usually is.

Indeed, a Florida court has held that the failure to admit neuroscience evidence during capital sentencing is grounds for a reversal.

Is a judge imposition of death over-riding a jury decision of life imprisonment violating the constitutional requirement for reliability of capital sentencing?

The Mayor, who is black, recalled that "for many years I have opposed capital punishment because of the racial disparities in capital sentencing."

He endorsed a scheme of "guided discretion" for juries, setting criteria and procedures to cure the previous random nature of capital sentencing.

The current system of capital sentencing, which the Supreme Court likes to call guided discretion, is not quite an oxymoron.

Yet the Supreme Court in 1987 ruled that race discrimination in capital sentencing can't be proved by statistical documentation, no matter how compelling.

Another amendment would seek to bar race discrimination in capital sentencing.

Why not, considering all the evidence that race is a hidden element in capital sentencing, and not just in the South, where most death sentences are meted out?