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Effect of capital punishment
The significance of the death penalty
The significance of the death penalty
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Capital Punishment in America
Capital punishment is the execution of a perpetrator for committing a heinous crime (homicide), and it is a hotly debated topic in our society. The basic issue is whether capital punishment should be allowed as it is today, or abolished in part or in whole. My argument is that:
1) Capital punishment is not an effective deterrent for heinous crimes.
2) Life imprisonment can be worse of a punishment than death, not as
costly as execution, and better for rehabilitation.
3) The innocent can be wrongly put to death.
Conclusion: Capital punishment should be abolished.
Though capital punishment might seem like the only way to get revenge, it is morally unjust. Who are we to decide whether a person should live or die? It is morally wrong, individually or through government action, to seek revenge on a murderer by means of execution. The death penalty violates our right to life.
Capital Punishment is Not an Effective Deterrent
As justification for capital punishment, deterrence is used to suggest that executing murderers will decrease the homicide rate by causing other potential murderers not to commit murder from fear of being executed themselves and obviously the murderer who is executed will not kill again. This position may seem initially correct, and indeed, in a USA Today Poll, 68% of respondents agreed that the death penalty is an effective deterrence for crimes. However, some research suggests that rather than deterring homicide, state executions actually may cause an increase in the number of homicides (Stack, 1990). This phenomenon has been called the "brutalization hypothesis" and it suggests that through proposition, modeling, or by legitimizing killing, the death penalty actually causes an increase in homicides. Thus, the brutalization hypothesis is a reason for opposing the death penalty.
On the other hand, a study prepared for the UN in 1988 showed that abolishing the death penalty shows no significant change in the number of crimes committed. Since Canada’s abolishing of the death penalty in 1975, homicide rate actually decreased 27 percent (up to 1993).
Life Imprisonment
Life imprisonment can be worse of a punishment than death for many convicted murderers. Instead of an easy out, these people will have to live out their lives without many of the freedoms and rights you and I ta...
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... Rights and Fundamental Freedoms, which has now been ratified by 33 European countries; Protocol to the American Convention on Human Rights to Abolish the Death Penalty, which has been ratified by six countries in the Americas and signed by two others. Protocol No. 6 is meant only to abolish the peace penalty in peacetime. The other two are meant for total abolishment.
Sixty-eight prisoners were executed in the United States in 1998, bring the total for an even five hundred since the death penalty was resumed in 1977. Over 3500 prisoners were under the sentence of death as off April 1, 1999. Thirty-eight of the fifty US states now provide for the death penalty law. The death penalty is also provided under the US military and civilian law.
Hopefully I’ve made the point that the death penalty is useless except for delivering some sort of closure to a victims’ loved ones, through this type of closure is morally wrong, and can be achieved through life imprisonment of the murderer. And because capital punishment is not an effective deterrent, because life imprisonment is a better option, and because the innocent wouldn’t have to die; capital punishment should be abolished.
Many people are led to believe that the death penalty doesn’t occur very often and that very few people are actually killed, but in reality, it’s quite the opposite. According to the Bureau of Justice Statistics, 1,359 people have been executed as a result of being on death row since 1977 to 2013. Even though this form of punishment is extremely controversial, due to the fact that someone’s life is at stake, it somehow still stands to this very day as our ultimate form of punishment. Although capital punishment puts murderers to death, it should be abolished because killing someone who murdered another, does not and will not make the situation any better in addition to costing tax payers millions of dollars.
Capital punishment results in the victims family gaining a greater sense of security, making sure the criminal is able to be punished to the highest degree for his crime, and honoring retribution. The issue of capital punishment has created a division
Proponents of capital punishment believe that killing criminals is a moral and ethical way of punishing them. They feel there is justification in taking the life of a certain criminal, when in fact that justification is nothing more than revenge. They also feel that the death penalty deters crime, although there have been no conclusive studies confirming that viewpoint (Bedau).
It is the firm belief and position here that committing such a crime as murder is punishable by death. Americans should take a position for anyone on death row, to be executed sooner rather than later.
... execute should not be made lightly, and tests should be done to ensure the right person is being punished for the crime that was committed. Taking away the person’s life who is responsible for the death of another person cannot bring the victim back and does not solve anything. Various people all over the world believe that the death penalty should not be supported and that it should be abolished. Many reasons exist for the abolition of the death penalty to take place including cost issues, religious issues, whether or not it acts as a deterrent, executing innocents and the harshness of the execution. Some may say the people who committed the most heinous crimes deserve to have justice served to them. However, even murderers are humans and should be treated fairly and justly. All people, even the guilty have a right to live; regardless of the crimes they committed.
One of society’s main questions today is how can we lower the rates of these heinous crimes in our country. The answer is giving them the highest consequence for their crime: death. Although people have argued that issuing the death penalty does not deter crime, there is a significant amount of evidence to prove it HAS lowered crimes such as murder.
The Death Penalty should be discontinued to the families, human rights, and statistics. The families of the victim and the family of the one, who committed the crime, have no closure at all. The death penalty is killing a human for being convicted of a terrible crime one family may think its right but both suffer by their lost ones. “Although true closure is never really possible for the families, studies have shown that the continual process, along with the returning to court for many years, force families to confront the gruesome details of the crime many times over, making it impossible to get on with their lives. As difficult as that is the question is weather the victims needs are met effectively by killing someone else and causing another family grief and pain as well as adding to the cycle of violence.” (Progress) As both families do not want to see each other because they all have pain and hate for one another. They both relive the last memories of their loved one and they can’t help but cry and stare at the pictures they were once happy in. The families both have sadness when its their loved ones birthday. If the victim is married or have kids, their kids suffer and the husband/wife suffer as well. Although the families will never get there loved one back they still suffer on what had happen. Both families blame one another for having to take flowers, to their dead family member or visit their family member in a cemetery because of what happen. None of them is truly happy that they lost a family member. The families miss the person who seemed so happy, and also know that they are in a better place watching over them. Although the families aren’t happy about losing them, but are relieved to know that nothing else can hurt them. As one family feels sorry for the other family, there could be the family that doesn’t care what happens but wants everyone to suffer the way they are suffering about the tragic death of one family member.
Americans have argued over the death penalty since the early days of our country. In the United States, only 38 states have capital punishment statutes. As of year ended in 1999, in Texas, the state had executed 496 prisoners since 1930. Laws in the United States have changed drastically in regards to capital punishment. An example of this would be the years from 1968 to 1977 due to the nearly 10 year moratorium.
Some argue that a life sentence to prison isn’t enough for the most heinous of crimes,
Currently, there are thirty-two states still using capital punishment. The United States is the only country in the Americas to execute people with rates approaching 1,300 since 1976. Their method of execution consists of lethal injection, electrocution (electric chair), and the gas chamber (www.deathpenalty.procon.org). Over the years, a variety of races have been sentenced to death. About 43% White, 42% Black, 13% Hispanic and 2% other are currently on death row. Texas, Alabama, Ohio, and Virginia are the states with the highest execution rates. Overall in the United States, 39% of citizens believe that the accused should have life without parole as well as having restrictions, 9% said they should have life with parole, 13% without parole, 33% support the death penalty, and 6% have no opinion (www.clarkprosecutor.org). In the United States, the death penalty consists of different standards between the Federal and State governments. The States primarily chose if they want to have the option of using capital punishments on their people, not the Federal government. However, the Federal government does have their own death penalty which is used to attain sentences where the death sentence is not used. Federal death penalties are mostly used under that circumstance and therefore isn’t used much because majority of the states have the punishment. More than 98% of people are
First of all, it is hard for anyone to argue that we already use the death penalty too much because facts say that we hardly use it at all. Since 1967, there have been one execution for every 1,600 murders. There have been approximately 560,000 murders and 358 executions between 1967 and 1996(UCR and BJS).
Does just one murder justify another murder as long as it is done in the name of justice? It is not justice if it is taking a life to show that the crime is wrong. The death penalty causes much pain for everyone attached to it in anyway. It rips apart families hoping for a better life and it tears down hope for the innocent inmates on death row. If the inmates know they will die. they can give up on anything and anyone. The death penalty is cruel to the inmates and not helpful to the inmates families most ways. The death penalty should be abolished because it puts the U.S in financial stress, kills many innocent people, is a slow and painful process for the inmate and their families, and shows much racial bias throughout it.
In the article “10 reasons The Death Penalty Should Be legal,” Anderson interprets two separate studies performed in the state of illinois and at the University of Colorado in Denver that analyze whether capital punishment has deterred the rate of homicide. Both studies concluded that 3/18 lives could be saved by the execution of a blameworthy killer. Although, two studies is a very low number in which more research and data collection would be necessary to ensure the accuracy of this information. There is also a number of inconsistencies in studies where statisticians have concluded that the death penalty deters crime. The article “States Without Death Penalty Have Lower Murder Rates,” by Amnesty International, a global movement of people debating the injustices, invalidates the article written by Anderson. Amnesty International claims that “States without the death penalty continue to have significantly lower murder rates than those that retain capital punishment.” A study by a Sociology professor and a graduate student at the University of Colorado-Boulder, in which builds upon the research compassed in 1996, analyzes the viewpoint of criminology experts on the deterrence effects of capital punishment. It was concluded that 88% or 67 out of 73 professionals do not think that the death penalty deters crime. Some experts further expressed their belief through backing it up with practical evidence. For instance, in 2007 the homicide rates in states that have the death penalty exceeds states that have abolished it by 42%. It is concluded that the death penalty is in fact not a deterrent to
Crimes whose outcome is the death penalty are known as capital crimes or capital offences. In the past, many countries have practiced capital punishment. According to Amnesty International, over two-thirds of the countries in the world – 139 – have now abolished the death penalty in law or practice. 58 nations continue to practice it while eight have eradicated it for ordinary crimes, only maintaining it for special circumstances. The death penalty has also been imposed for other serious crimes such as armed robbery, rape, treason, and kidnapping....
The death penalty greatly discourages citizens from committing crimes like murder. The greatest fear for many people is death. If they know that execution is a common consequence for their actions, they are going to think twice before committing them. Even in jails, the fear of death can deter an inmate already serving a life sentence from killing a guard or another inmate. When a potential murderer realizes that a murderer’s punishment is execution, then that person is discouraged from going through with the murder. The first studies were conducted in 1973 by Isaac Ehrlich linking executions to a lowered murder rate, and for every murderer executed a potential of three people were saved from murder (insert citation). A more modern...