FREE ESSAY ON CAPITAL PUNISHMENT

CAPITAL PUNISHMENT

Capital Punishment
The use of capital punishment has been a permanent fixture in society since the earliest

civilizations and continues to be used as a form of punishment in countries today. It has

been used for various crimes ranging from the desertion of soldiers during wartime to the

more heinous crimes of serial killers. However, the mere fact that this brutal form of 
punishment and revenge has been the policy of many nations in the past does not 
subsequently warrant its implementation in today's society. The death penalty is morally

and socially unethical, should be construed as cruel and unusual punishment since it is
both 
discriminatory and arbitrary, has no proof of acting as a deterrent, and risks the
atrocious 
and unacceptable injustice of executing innocent people. As long as capital punishment 
exists in our society it will continue to spark the injustice which it has failed to
curb. 
Capital punishment is immoral and unethical. It does not matter who does the 
killing because when a life is taken by another it is always wrong. By killing a human 
being the state lessens the value of life and actually contributes to the growing
sentiment in 
today's society that certain individuals are worth more than others. When the value of
life 
is lessened under certain circumstances such as the life of a murderer, what is stopping

others from creating their own circumstances for the value of one's life such as race,
class, 
religion, and economics. Immanual Kant, a great philosopher of ethics, came up with the 
Categorical Imperative, which is a universal command or rule that states that society and

individuals must act in such a way that you can will that your actions become a universal

law for all to follow (Palmer 265). There must be some set of moral and ethical 
standards that even the government can not supersede, otherwise how can the state expect

its citizens not to follow its own example. 
Those who support the death penalty believe, or claim to believe, that capital 
punishment is morally and ethically acceptable. The bulk of their evidence comes from the

Old Testament which actually recommends the use of capital punishment for a number of 
crimes. Others also quote the Sixth Commandment which, in the original Hebrew reads, 
Thou Shall Not Commit Murder. However, these literal interpretations of selected 
passages from the Bible which are often quoted out of context corrupt the compassionate 
attitude of Judaism and Christianity, which clearly focuses on redemption and
forgiveness, 
and urges humane and effective ways of dealing with crime and violence. Those who use 
the Bible to support the death penalty are by themselves since almost all religious
groups 
in the United States regard executions as immoral. They include, American Baptist 
Churches USA, American Jewish Congress, California Catholic Council, Christian 
reformed Church, Episcopal Church, Lutheran Church in America, Mennonite General 
Conference, National Council of Churches of Christ in the USA, Northern Ecumenical 
Council, Presbyterian Church (USA), Reformed Church of America, Southern California 
Ecumenical Council, Unitarian/Universalist Association, United Church of Christ, and the

United Methodist Church (Death Penalty Focus). 
Those that argue that the death penalty is ethical state that former great leaders 
and thinkers such as George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Franklin, Kant, 
Locke, Hobbes, Rousseau, Montesquieu, and Mill all supported it (Koch 324). However, 
Washington and Jefferson, two former presidents and admired men, both supported 
slavery as well. Surely, the advice of someone who clearly demonstrated a total disregard

for the value of human life cannot be considered in such an argument as capital 
punishment. In regard to the philosophers, Immanuel Kant, a great ethical philosopher 
stated that the motives behind actions determine whether something is moral or immoral 
(Palmer 271). The motives behind the death penalty, which revolve around revenge and 
the frustration and rage of people who see that the government is not coping with violent

crime, are not of good will, thereby making capital punishment immoral according to 
ethical philosophy (Bruck 329). 
The question of whether executions are a cruel form of punishment may no 
longer be an argument against capital punishment now that it can be done with lethal 
injections, but it is still very unusual in that it only applies to a select number of 
individuals making the death penalty completely discriminatory and arbitrary. After years

of watching the ineffectiveness of determining who should be put to death, the Supreme 
Court in the1972 Furman v. Georgia decision invalidated all existing death sentence 
statues as violative of the Eighth Amendment's ban on cruel and unusual punishment and 
thus depopulated state death rows of 629 occupants (Berger 352). This decision was 
reached not because it was believed that the death penalty was intrinsically cruel and 
unusual but because, as Justice Stewart put it, the death penalty as actually applied was

unconstitutionally arbitrary (Berger 353). Local politics, money, race, and where the 
crime is committed can often play a more decisive role in sentencing someone to death 
than the actual facts of the crime. According to Amnesty International, the death penalty

is a lethal lottery: just one out of every one hundred people arrested for murder is
actually 
executed (Death Penalty Focus). In regards to racial discrimination in sentencing, it has

been found that racial bias focuses primarily on the race of the victim, not the
defendant 
(Berger 355). Only 31 out of the more than 15, 000 recorded executions in this country 
have been of white defendants convicted of killing black victims, while black defendants

convicted of raping white women were commonly sentenced to death (Death Penalty 
Focus). Stephen Nathanson, a professor of philosophy at Northwestern University 
addresses the problems of discrimination and randomness best by saying, as long as 
racial, class, religious, and economic bias continue to be important determinants of who
is 
executed, the death penalty will continue to create and perpetuate injustice (Nathanson 
346). 
Proponents of capital punishment believe that the argument that the death penalty 
is discriminatory and arbitrary does not give support to the abolition of capital 
punishment, but rather to the extension of it. Edward Koch, the former mayor of New 
York from 1978 to 1989 and death penalty supporter, states that the discriminatory 
manner of the death penalty no longer seems to be the problem it once was, yet in 1987, 
the Supreme Court case of McCleskey v. Kemp established that in Georgia someone who 
kills a white person is four times more likely to be sentenced to death than someone who

kills a black person (Death Penalty Focus). In response to this, supporters of the death

penalty believe that the death penalty should be extended to all murders. This is what
was 
attempted after the Furman decision. A number of states sought to resolve the 
discriminatory and arbitrary nature of the death penalty by simply sentencing to death 
everyone convicted of first-degree murder, but the Supreme Court rejected this proposal 
saying that mandatory death sentence laws did not really resolve the problem but instead

'simply papered [it] over' since juries responded by refusing to convict certain
arbitrarily 
chosen defendants of first-degree murder (Berger 353). 
An argument against the death penalty which to sensible and decent persons should 
seem undeniable is the fact that innocent people have been murdered by the state in the 
past and in all probability more will follow. The wrongful execution of an innocent
person 
is such an awful injustice that in any civilized society could never be justified, yet
this is 
the message that the United States is willing to pronounce. Simply put by Professor 
Nathanson, to maintain the death penalty is to be willing to risk innocent lives. In
1987, 
a study conducted by Hugo Bedau and Michael Radelet appeared in the Standford Law 
Review concerning the execution of innocent people. The study concluded that in the 
period between 1900 to 1980, about 350 people were wrongfully convicted of capital 
offenses, 139 of the 350 were sentenced to death, and 23 were actually executed 
(Nathanson 344). Over this eighty year period this figure averages out to the death of an

innocent person about every 3.4 years. This fact is extremely disturbing and rightfully
so, 
yet death penalty advocates blatantly disregard the information or attempt to justify it
in 
some way. 
Those who support capital punishment claim that such cases of innocent people 
being executed have never occurred. For instance, Edward Koch quotes Hugo Bedau in 
support of his claim that such cases are not true, saying it is false sentimentality to
argue 
that the death penalty should be abolished because of the abstract possibility that an 
innocent person might be executed. Koch, in an attempt to gain political support, acted 
quite unethically by quoting Bedau out of context and implying that such cases have not 
occurred. According to David Bruck, a prominent lawyer for South Carolina Office of 
Appellate Defense, all Bedau was saying was that doubts concerning executed prisoners' 
guilt are almost never resolved. Koch also failed to relate in his essay that Bedau, who

had not yet released the 1987 study, had already comprised a list of murder convictions 
since 1900 in which the state eventually admitted error in about 400 hundred cases. 
Another response to the fact that innocent people have been executed is that the 
small number of innocents executed outweighs the number of lives that will be saved since

the possibility of being executed will deter others from committing a murder, and also
lives 
will be saved since that murderer cannot kill again. Scientific studies have failed to
prove 
that executions deter other people from committing crime. According to Dr. Ernest van 
den Haag, a well-known scholar in favor of the death penalty, one cannot claim that it
has 
been proved statistically that the death penalty does deter more than alternative
penalties 
(Haag 338). However, Haag supports his stand on the death penalty by stating that, 
when they have the choice between life and death, 99 percent of all prisoners under 
sentence of death prefer life in prison. This statistic proves nothing but the fact that
man 
has an innate desire for survival. Those asked the question have already committed the 
crime and thus does not reflect the sentiment of those considering a crime. Also, people

often kill when under great emotional stress or under the influence of drugs or alcohol -

times when they are not thinking of the consequences (Death Penalty Focus). Career 
criminals and those that plan a crime do not expect to get caught, thus making the 
consequences an invalid issue. 
In response to the fact that a executed murderer will never kill again, society must 
ask itself whether it is morally and ethically acceptable to risk killing an innocent
person 
when an alternative such as life imprisonment without possibility of parole exists. In 
California since 1978, more than 1,000 people have received this alternate sentence which

includes no appeals process. The public can be assured that those who commit heinous 
murders and receive this sentence will never be free again. According to Death Penalty 
Focus, a recent Field Poll showed support for the death penalty plummeted when 
alternative sentencing is available. Just 29 percent favored death over life without
parole 
plus requiring the defendant to work in prison and give part of his earnings as
restitution 
to the families of his victims. 
The use of capital punishment has endured throughout the ages, yet its use today 
in a civilized society should no longer be acceptable to morally and ethically conscience

individuals. The vast majority of countries in Western Europe and North and South 
America - more than 80 nations worldwide - have abandoned capital punishment, yet the 
United States remains an avid supporter in company with countries such as Iran, Iraq, and

China as one of the major users of capital punishment (Death Penalty Focus). The use of 
the death penalty in its discriminatory and arbitrary methods only magnifies inequalities
of 
race that persist in the criminal justice system and in American society generally
(Berger 
355). Even with the death of a guilty man, innocence is lost, for even Edward Koch 
admits that the death of anyone - even a convicted killer - diminishes us all. But it is
a 
sad commentary on the state of this country when we are willing to accept the avoidable 
death of an innocent man and allow the death penalty to continue to create and 
perpetuate injustice. 
Works Cited 
Berger, Vivian, Rolling the Dice to Decide Who Dies, New York State Bar Journal, 
October 1988. 
Bruck, David, The Death Penalty, The New Republic, May 20, 1985. 
Death Penalty Focus (DPF), Myths and Facts about California's Death Penalty, pamphlet 
Koch, Edward, Death and Justice: How Capital Punishment Affirms Life, The New 
Republic, April 15, 1985. 
Nathanson, Stephen, What If the Death Penalty Did Save Lives? An Eye for an Eye? 
The Morality of Punishing by Death, 1987. 
Palmer, Donald, Does the Center Hold? An Introduction to Western Philosophy, Mayfield 
Publishing Company, London, 1996. 
Van den Haag, Ernest, The Death Penalty Pro and Con: A Debate, 1983. 
Bibliography
Works Cited 
Berger, Vivian, Rolling the Dice to Decide Who Dies, New York State Bar Journal, 
October 1988. 
Bruck, David, The Death Penalty, The New Republic, May 20, 1985. 
Death Penalty Focus (DPF), Myths and Facts about California's Death Penalty, pamphlet 
Koch, Edward, Death and Justice: How Capital Punishment Affirms Life, The New 
Republic, April 15, 1985. 
Nathanson, Stephen, What If the Death Penalty Did Save Lives? An Eye for an Eye? 
The Morality of Punishing by Death, 1987. 
Palmer, Donald, Does the Center Hold? An Introduction to Western Philosophy, Mayfield 
Publishing Company, London, 1996. 
Van den Haag, Ernest, The Death Penalty Pro and Con: A Debate, 1983.