Death Penalty

A detailed Summary of Death Penalty

Capital punishment is not a new concept. It is older then the Roman Empire, and has changed much since it's first use. Death through drowning, crucifixion, or hanging, or throwing form a high rock, or being thrown into a fiery furnace, or firing squad, or electric chair or the gas chamber-through the years these methods as well as others not mentioned have been what the world governments have used to instill fear in the populace, in order to maintain control. However in today's society, especially in the United States of America capital punishment has come to be something else. It is no longer a means of control; rather it has become a system of punishment in which the most heinous of criminals can be dealt with swiftly and justly. Through the reading of this paper you will learn the arguments for and against the death penalty, respectively, as well as what I believe to be the proper moral choice and why.

Death penalty opponents state that "Those who support the death penalty see it as a solution to violent crime. Opponents, hereby, present one of many fabrications. In reality, executions are seen as the appropriate punishment for certain criminals committing specific crimes. So says the U.S. Supreme Co

Another significant oversight by that study was not differentiating between the risk of executing innocent persons before and after Furman v Georgia (1972). There is, in fact, no proof that an innocent has been executed since 1900. And the probability of such a tragedy occurring has been lowered significantly more since Furman. In the context that hundreds of thousands of innocents have been murdered or seriously injured, since 1900, by criminals improperly released by the U.S. criminal justice system the relevant question is: Is the risk of executing the innocent, however slight, worth the justifications for the death penalty-those being retribution, rehabilitation, incapacitation, required punishment, deterrence, escalating punishments, religious mandates, cost savings, the moral imperative, just punishment and the saving of innocent lives? Predictably, opponents still continue to fraudulently claim, even today, that this study has proven that 23 "innocent" people have been executed, even though Bedau and Radelet, the authors of that study, conceded in 1988 that neither they nor any previous researchers have proved that any of those executed was innocent: "We agree with our critics that we have not proved these executed defendants to be innocent; we never claimed that we had" (41, 1 Stanford Law Review, 11/1988).

As much as I think that the death penalty is needed, in our country, it is ineffective. It does not achieve the desired effect, which is to deter more crime from occurring. I feel that the current system is not a good one and in need of changes. First and foremost, if a person is found guilty of murder in the first degree, and sentenced to death, it should be carried out within 6 months of sentencing. Not only will this reduce the cost for taxpayers, it may just strike fear into those who are thinking they can get away with murder, through appeals and what not. Next those who are vicious like serial killers should get no appeals and be executed within a week of sentencing. If the government will show the public that it means business when it comes to capital punishment, then we may start to see some kind of reduction in violent crime.

urt and so say most death penalty supporters. The controversy over capital punishment is not new to the western world. It has been the main recourse against those who commit the most serious crimes. In the 13th century, England replaced mutilation with hanging, as there method of execution. This became, in most parts of the country, a daily thing. The townspeople would all come out to watch the hanging. The settlers of the United States of America were from European countries, so naturally the beliefs and methods of government that were present in Europe would be in part the foundation of the beliefs and methods of government here in America. So capital punishment in America started with the belief, that to maintain control there must be some kind of justice system set up to where the Nation as well as the individual State has the power to punish the most serious of criminals without regard or hesitation. The executions were a public event, in which most of the town would attend, just the same as in England. It has been here since our inception as a nation and has no signs of changing. Domestic approval for the death penalty remains well over sixty percent. In fact, the closest execution has ever come to being illegal was back in 1972, when the Supreme Court, in its 5-4 decision Furman vs. Georgia, struck down the capital punishment statutes of 39 states. Even then, although the court ruled that the death penalty violated the Eighth Amendment's prohibition of cruel and unusual punishment, it emphasized that it was only illegal in the way it was then administered. Execution itself, it said, was not unconstitutional. Opponents equate execution and mu!

As a matter of fact, the fear of neglecting details and legal means to which the sentenced person can apply protracts trials an

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Approximate Word count = 2839
Approximate Pages = 11 (250 words per page double spaced)

Category: Politics