In the 1970s the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in ________ that the death penalty-as it was being applied-was unconstitutional, but the ________ decision ruled the death penalty was constitutional when specific guidelines are followed.

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In the 1970s, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Furman v. Georgia (1972) that the death penalty, as it was being applied at the time, was unconstitutional due to its arbitrary and discriminatory enforcement, violating the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments. However, in Gregg v. Georgia (1976), the Court ruled that the death penalty itself was not unconstitutional, provided that specific guidelines were in place to prevent arbitrary and discriminatory sentencing. This established a new legal framework for the death penalty in the United States.