nal defense attorney to represent them. They are forced to use inexperienced, underpaid court-appointed attorneys.

By applying capital punishment, we imply that we are objective judges (which we are not). That we are perfect (which we are not), that we have the right to assign punishment (which we do not), and finally and most significantly, by killing a prisoner, we affirm that we deserve to live. It is an action of pride, which seeks to affirm our superiority to someone else. To say that the death penalty is racist does not imply that black men are exceptionally violent. It means that the death penalty itself is applied in a racist fashion because it is a component of a racist justice system and a racist society.

In most states the pay for court appointed attorneys is so low that lawyers

Some common words found in the essay are:
, death penalty, oppose death, oppose death penalty, abolish death penalty, people argue, abolish death, death row,
Approximate Word count = 538
Approximate Pages = 2 (250 words per page double spaced)