capital punishment
At present, there are thirty-six states in the United States and over one hundred countries that have legislation enforcing capital punishment for crimes of murder or rape. In Canada the death penalty was abolished in 1976, due to the fact that it infringes on the rights of Canadians as documented by the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.1 Also, there was much influence from the citizens of the country to debate this very serious topic. Capital punishment regardless of the crime committed is legally wrong, and represents a total disregard for human dignity. By examining issues of discrimination, the severity of the punishment, the fact that retribution is unjustified, and concerns with deterrents, illustrates that the death penalty violates the basic rights of individuals. In viewing the legal rights of citizens particularly in Canada supported by the morality of this judgement, it is easy to see why this punishment no longer exists in Canada. From established statistics it was found that there seems to be a striking correlation between the race of the offenders and the probability of them receiving a death sentence. In capital cases, black defendants statistically receive the death sentence more
One question that arises in most debates is that what happens if the person was wrongly convicted, and an innocent person is sent to death row. In November nineteen-eighty-nine "Toronto lawyer Clayton Ruby told Amnesty International supporters that he has no faith in the infallibly of the Canadian justice system, because it wrongfully condemned innocent people". He also spoke of Donald Marshall a Mic Mac Indian from Nova Scotia as one example of an innocent man who would have been executed if Canada had the death penalty. After eleven years in prison for a murder he did not commit. He was released in nineteen-eighty-two. More recently David Milgaard was released from prison on an order form the Supreme Court. He had spent twenty three years in jail. The Crown had dropped the case against him and he continues to maintain his innocence, as he should have in the first place. 6 "I view the death penalty as a barbaric and immoral institution which undermines the conscience and the legal foundations of a society. I reject the belief that the death penalty has a deterrent effect on potential murderers. In fact I strongly contend that the opposite is true, and brutality only leads to more brutality."18
Some common words found in the essay are:
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Approximate Word count = 4738
Approximate Pages = 19 (250 words per page double spaced)
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