Evaluating such patterns requires subjective decisions about classifying similar patterns, allocating the burden of proof, using systematic patterns to decide individual cases, and setting standards about improper variations in sentencing. The paradox involved in providing such an arbitrary review indicates the need for adopting a tragic perspective on capital punishment. From this perspective, various positions on the propriety of the death penalty can be understood as tactics to avoid the tragic dilemma resulting from the inability of our cultural framework of values to resolve the dispute about the justice of executions. Despite the need for a realistic standard of reasonable levels of arbitrariness, the courts have adopted a virtually impossible standard of review of sentencing patterns that serves to avoid the dilemma and legitimize the death penalty, but at the expense of honesty and perhaps fair and equal treatment as well. 224 footnotes. (Author abstract modified)