Capital Punishment
Table of contents
1. Introduction
2. Cons and pros of the death penalty
3. The death penalty and the mass media
4. Immorality of the death penalty
5. Conclusion
Introduction
Capital punishment is the cruelest and the most terrible punishment that exists
nowadays in the world. Losing your life you loose everything that connect you
with the real life. There is an opinion that fear of death is the strongest
fear.
The main aim of this work is to find all advantages and disadvantages of the
capital punishment. Personally I stand against such kind of punishment. There
is an ancient proverb, which states that it’s better to forgive ten guilty
than to punish one innocent. The truth, stated in this proverb must be the basis
of warranting guilty verdict, especially when it comes to death penalties. I’ll
do my best to prove my opinion and persuade my opponents. All in all I understand
my opponent’s opinion and respect it.
The statistics states that only on the territory of the United States about
250 people are sentenced to death every year. 35 of them are executed. The sentence
comes through two phases before it is executed: the first phase includes hearing
the trial and verdict of judges and the second phase is serving of a sentence.
Sometimes retrial is possible, but if the members of the jury propose the death
penalty and the judge agrees, execution will take place.
The most common form of execution nowadays is lethal injection. This new method
of execution was invented not long ago, and it’s the most widespread method
used nowadays. In the middle of the 20th century from 1972 t o1976 the death
penalty wasn’t allowed in the USA due to the eighth Amendment. Invention
of lethal injection renewed its use.
Cons and pros of the death penalty
Opinion of those, who support the death penalty, can be logically proved. Their
point of view is proved by a number of arguments. The number of murders and
hard crimes is lower in those countries where the capital punishment is an official
penalty. The fear of death for crimes reduces such crimes. The level of the
order in such countries is very high, as it’s based on fear and intimidation.
People also say that the death penalty puts something like moral bounds due
to special crimes such as murder, ravishment, etc and crossing these bounds
people lose all their morality and the it’s only left to kill them. Another
aspect is that dead person who was a multiple murderer isn’t able to kill
anybody when his term of imprisonment will come to the end or if he escapes.
All these facts must be taken into consideration but there is another aspect
that, to my mind, is the most important and can cross out all the others. This
aspect is called morality and humanity.
First of all let’s correlate the death penalty with ten tables from the
Bible. By Christianity killing a person is a great sin. Death penalty is the
same killing even if it’s aimed to punish the murderer. Christians think
that God placed every person on the Earth for the exact aim that should be realized.
Killing a person deprives him of his right to carry out his mission. Execution
is not the natural death. Some Christian sources say that only natural death
can lead to Heavens, all other deaths leave people in the realm of shadows with
no way out. Christians couldn’t accept the death penalty in any case.
10 tables of the Bible are norms of every society. They form the morality of
every civilization. Jesus taught people to forgive those who have made you harm
you and return good for evil. We will never exterminate the evil if we do evil
for evil. In such a case the evil would only double on the Earth. How differs
action of the murderer from the person who gives a lethal injection? Won’t
this person accuse himself of killing during all his further life? These both
actions are murders and all the other circumstances are not very important.
The death penalty for some crimes intimidate other people, the fear of death
doesn’t allow people to commit a crime. The organization of the society
is based on intimidation, but is it a healthy society. Does this society is
able to give a possibility for the development of high-organized, independent
individuality with free thoughts and intentions? I am completely sure that it
is not. The fear of anything can bring up only slaves. People see that the value
of the life isn’t high in the society. If one person can be killed even
if he needs the highest punishment, then one day this punishment can become
acceptable even for less serious crimes. The person realizes that if the death
penalty exists it can threaten himself even if he doesn’t commit a crime.
This fear can exist in subconsciousness.
Another aspect of the capital punishment is the possibility to execute an innocent
person. Jury and judges are ordinary people, so they can make mistakes. Death
sentence can become an error that will cost someone’s life. Who will be
responsible for the death of an innocent person? Of course, that judge who pronounced
sentence on death would be put into prison or have another kind of responsibility,
but who will be able to return the life of the innocent person? Nobody and it’s
the main point in the question of the death penalty. Human factor doesn’t
give us a possibility to pass 100% fair sentences. Human life is sacred even
if this person has killed another person. This murder will lie on his conscience
and he’ll answer for all his crimes. Nobody has a right to encroach on
the sanctity of human life, even the state.
In the history of the United States of America two death penalties that were
fulfilled then were found incorrect. The two persons were found innocent but
they were already killed. It happened in 1918 and 1949. Those who stand for
the death penalty affirm that such a miserable number in a rather long time
span isn’t so bad, but such arguments loose all their power when we speak
about human life.
The main aim of the person on the Earth is to reach progress and develop capabilities.
All the persons can make mistakes and then have a possibility to correct them.
The capital punishment doesn’t give such a possibility to condemned persons
who committed a blunder. To die is sometimes easier then to live with you sins
and realize what you have done.
There is an opinion that the existence of the death penalty decreases the number
of crimes but at the same time another statistics show reverse result.
The number of criminals sentenced to death represented by the mentally ill people,
male, poor and minorities are met more often than other sections of population.
Women are sentenced to the death penalty very rarely, it’s more men’s
fate. If you try to come to know the particulars of the condemned person you’ll
see that he was abused during his childhood, came through sufferings and unfairness.
Of course, the murder couldn’t be warrant in any case, but we can understand
what made him the murder.
It goes without saying that alive can do more than dead. The criminals work
and the payment of their work goes to the society, to the victim’s family
for example. There is a number of examples when people sentenced to life imprisonment
invented something and made their contributions in the society. In 1924 two
nineteen-year-old boys killed a boy. They were sentenced not to death but to
life imprisonment. Their behavior in prison was an example for other prisoners,
they worked in prison hospitals, taught them to read, created a school in prison
and wrote a grammar book. Their asset in the improvement of the life of prisoners
is priceless.
Another argument against execution is that it’s the cruelest punishment
not suitable for the civilized society. The Eighth Amendment of the American
Constitution tried to fight against death penalty and even succeeded in it in
the 1970s but its success didn’t last long. Eternal struggle for or against
the capital punishment moved away them from the punishment itself. When the
Constitution was just in project, the question of death penalty wasn’t
even discussed, it wasn’t thought abnormal and more over immoral. Most
creators of the Constitution approved such kind of punishment. The laws of the
state form people’s morality and show what is good and permitted. The
possibility to kill even if it’s a kind of punishment can lead the using
of this method among ordinary people.
The death penalty and the mass media
Law and media coexist and overlap in the modern society. People create their
opinion, drop their conclusions guided by the information they get from mass
media and very seldom think about the credibility of this information. In modern
society, the impact of mass media is so big that it not only passes the legal
norms to the population, but also has the power to influence or even change
them.
Receiving publicity can become a serious problem for death eligible cases as
from the role of observer mass media becomes an active participant of the trial.
If death penalty is appointed, the media doesn’t leave any chance to the
charged person and the appellate procedure is usually illuminated as an annoying
delay on the way to the climax – execution. The question of moral issues,
appropriateness of the death penalty or its efficacy is surprisingly rarely
touched by the mass media. These questions can raise unnecessary doubts in the
minds of people and spoil dramatic effect, so diligently created. Another peculiar
feature of mass media’s covering the death issue is the lack of defensive
evidence, if any presented to the wide audience. The main line of narration
is usually lead from the part of prosecution – they have more TV air and
spaces in the magazines and newspapers. Defense doesn’t have these privileges.
Very seldom journalists try to show compassion to criminals. Another interesting
feature is that mass media tries to avoid the direct formulations, when talking
about the death itself, trying to use phrases like “came to meet death”,
“went to his final journey”, etc. They are usually afraid to minimize
the sufferings of the victim, by showing any humanity to putative criminal.
To be just, there are rare cases, when the topic innocent person unfairly condemned
is speculated, but these cases are rare and can not be regarded as general tendency.
“The role of denunciator conflicts with media’s role of impartial
chronicles” (Amari). Complicated or ambiguous cases are not so popular
among the media, as they need context, complex explanations and event chains
and let multi-faceted interpretations.
The influence of media coverage in brining the death penalty is especially strong.
“The feedback loop is especially visible at the legislative juncture,
when crime control policies are made at the prosecutorial juncture, when discretion
about capital charging is at work; and at the adjudicative juncture, when both
judge and jury must make difficult decision about sentencing” (Liebman,
78). The Eighth Amendment guarantees the right of people to express their opinion
and the importance of this opinion to be heard. Media becomes a transitional
point, which passes emotion from the courtroom to average observer. We get a
loop here – trying to answer the needs of the audience, mass media tries
to search for the facts, which would appeal most of all to this public. At the
same time, collecting such facts, media influences pubic opinion. The main difficulty
lies in the fact, that media prefers a selective depiction of events and the
selective emotional background for their coverage. Feelings of compassion, mercy
and sorrow to victims aren’t accompanied by even the smallest effort to
display compassion to the convicted person. The crime and criminal himself become
the incarnation of encroachment on the social legislative norms and stability.
Immorality of the death penalty
“Capital punishment is a barbaric remnant of an uncivilized society. It
is immoral in principle, and unfair and discriminatory in practice. It assures
the execution of some innocent people. As a remedy for crime, it has no purpose
and no effect” (American Civil Liberties Union National Office). Couple
of sentences exposes all immoral and inhumane roots of the death penalty.
All in all the moral argument is the strongest among all the arguments against
the death penalty. Human rights must be protected by the state but not all the
methods are admissible and possible. Even the state can’t avoid crossing
all the bounds. The death penalty is a kind of punishment, which supposes deprivation
of human life. Even if the number of executions is brought to minimum and death
penalty is used only to the cruelest murders and in particular cases, it’s
killing and give any change for the improvement of civilized society.
Penalty death is unnatural action as any kind of killing. It’s wrong morally,
it’s against all principles of the humanity. It’s even against the
laws of nature and I won’t even mention The Bible and its interpretation.
Taking human life is inhumane, we live among people, not animals, and we must
be guided by human laws. Capital punishment is just another formulation of killing
to avoid calling names in their real names. It’s God’s privilege
and no one even the state can take such responsibility and administer justice
and mete out punishment.
“The death penalty is irrevocable. “In case of a mistake, the executed
prisoner cannot be given another chance. Justice can miscarry. In the last hundred
years there have been more that 75 documented cases of wrongful conviction of
criminal homicide. The death sentence was carried out in eight of these cases”
(Draper 47). Even if the person gets to know that the sentenced was passed wrongly
and he is free, what can he do and is he capable to perceive all the world adequate
after years spent in prison waiting for the death every day? Is it moral to
break person’s life?
Conclusion
The death penalty is the cruelest punishment, which can be used in a number
of cases in some countries. Some people support such kind of punishment and
think that only such severe actions can keep the society in safety and provide
security. People believe that seeing sure punishment another people would be
afraid to commit crimes. It’s only one point of view, there is another
that is absolutely opposite and to my mind it’s more suitable for the
civilized society with principles of humanity and tolerance.
The actions of the state are the example of the behavior for all the other people.
Using the death penalty as a punishment the state pulls down the moral norms.
Life is a gift given by God, so only God can take it away. Death doesn’t
correct the mistake, it can only neutralize the murderer, but soon appear new
criminals. The murderer must realize his crime and beremosful of it. Way of
the mankind should reach peace and stability and deaths on its way are not admissible.
References
1. Amari Jane, Is crime coverage out of Balance? Research shows a Need for More
Reporting of Context, Perspective, Consequences, Risk Factors, NEWS WATCH, (Garnett
New Network), March 12, 1999, available at http://gannett.com/go/newswatch//99/march/nw032-1.htm
2. Liebman James et al., A Broken System, Part II: Why There Is So Much Error
in Capital Cases, and What Can be Done About It? (Feb. 11, 2002), available
at http://www2.law.columbia.edu/brokensystem2/index2.html.
3. Stephen Layson, “Homicide and Deterrence: Another View of the Canadian
Time-Series Evidence,” Canadian Journal of Economics, February 1983.
4. Isaac Ehrlich, “Capital Punishment and Deterrence: Some Further Thoughts,”
Journal of Political Economy, 1977.
