Capital punishment has a long history. The use of capital punishment dates all the way back to 2000 BC. People were put to death for cri

Not only is capital punishment a deterrent but it is also a safety net for society against harmful criminals. Even some criminals agree that the only way to stop some criminals from committing another murder is for the person to be executed (Kronenwetter 3). For example, a criminal named Westley Allan Dodd was convicted and executed for committing the crime of raping and murdering 3 young boys. One of the mitigating circumstances in the sentence he received was that while on trial he told the court he would be willing to kill prison guards in order to escape prison and seek out other young boys to rape and murder. Dodd was put to death on January 5th of 1993 (Kronenwetter 3). The Roman Catholic Church is even willing to support capital punishment in order to protect society. They believe that the death penalty enables society to uphold the worth of innocent human life (Haag 60). Capital punishment is thought of as the best way to keep society safe from harmful criminals not because it is the most violent, but because it is the most permanent, the most complete (Kronenwetter XI).

mes ranging all the way from murder down to petty theft. Today our society is said to have the most humane way of executing prisoners, lethal injection. Our countries past use of electrocution and gas chambers were even humane when compared to the methods of execution of the past. Which included being hanged, beheaded, stoned, stretched on racks, pressed to death with weights, cut into pieces, disemboweled, torn to pieces by horses, consumed by lions, burned alive, drowned, crucified and shot (Horwitz 13). In early civilizations punishment by death was used evenly at almost all times, therefore making it a good deterrent. Today however, the use of capital punishment is not meted out as evenly. Sometimes people feel that too much is taken into account when determining the out come of a criminal's trial. Even though there are set state laws, which dictate that if a certain crime is committed the death penalty must be used or looked at as punishment, not every one who commits that crime is subject to or receives the death penalty (Bedau 52). Most members of society believe that if capital punishment was applied more evenly and uniformly it would make a very good deterrent today (Karson 59). With all the discrepancies in the application of the death penalty, some criminals may think that capital punishment is a rare consequence to committing a crime. While there are problems in the consistency of capital punishment, over all it is a deterrent and one of the more popular ones used in the criminal justice system. Death penalty supporters say we execute murderers and those who commit other capital crimes in order to deter further capital crimes from being committed (Williams 25). The message of deterrence that is sent by execution is that murder and all other capital crimes are intolerable in today's society (Williams 26).

For those who believe that not all criminals can be rehabilitated, retribution is the prime punishment for these types of criminals. In American society one of the ways we use to gain retribution for capital offenses is by death. This type of

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Approximate Word count = 2143
Approximate Pages = 9 (250 words per page double spaced)