Kent State’s Stark campus honored Constitution Day Thursday with a morning flag ceremony and an informative afternoon faculty lecture about the constitutionality of the death penalty.

 Andrew Povtak, a professor of Constitutional Law at Kent Stark, held a lecture with the presentation “Death in the New Summer of Love! An Analysis of the U.S. Supreme Court’s Overlooked Death Penalty Case”  in the conference room of the Kent Stark library, as well as talking about the recent U.S. Supreme Court case about the death penalty Glossip vs. Gross.

 “In order to understand the significance of this case, we have to take a look at the (U.S.) Supreme Court and how it has dealt with the death penalty over (the) years, in the context of the Eighth Amendment,” Povtak said.

 The Supreme Court of the United States Blog notes that the case questioned whether executions carried out by the states including a three-drug protocol of midazolam, a sleeping agent, pancuronium bromide, a muscle relaxer and potassium chloride, which causes cardiac arrest when mixed with the other two compounds, violate the Eighth Amendment of the United States Constitution.

His lecture went into the multiple interpretations of the Constitution, its amendments and how inspiring change takes time.

 “People have a deference to the [Constitution],” said Povtak. “Change happens.”

 After the lecture, students were encouraged to ask questions about the topic of the death penalty and the Glossip v. Gross case.

Constitution Day is an acknowledgement of when America adopted the Constitution and also celebrates the idea of citizenship.

Contact Kathryn Rush at [email protected]