Preview

Is Capital a Bad Public Policy

Good Essays
Open Document
Open Document
319 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
Is Capital a Bad Public Policy
Hanging, the firing squad, the gas chamber, the electric chair, lethal injection; these are some present methods of the death penalty. Capital punishment has been used in America for a long time, and has always presented conflicts. There are many groups that protest capital punishment, and there are many groups that are for it. The controversies it presents have to do with the cost, if it is humane, or if it is moral. With all of these problems taken into consideration, it is clear to anyone that capital punishment is the wrong choice. Capital punishment has proven to neither deter criminals, neither directly reduce crime rate nor even rightfully punish rebellious members of society. Rather, capital punishment has cost the American people millions of dollars in maximum-security prisons and executions, wrongfully sentenced innocent men and women, and blatantly gone against the eighth amendment of the Constitution of the United States.
Every convicted felon waiting on death row costs the American people over nine million dollars yearly to imprison. Such an absurd amount of money should be spent on the rehabilitation of these troubled individuals rather than in prolonging their lives only for their own demise. Before reverting to the early philosophy of Hammurabi “an eye for an eye” America should look to its own foundation, the constitution, as well as compare the costs and benefits of such a policy being legal. Despite enormous protections offered by the federal and states constitutions throughout the United States, many people have been executed in spite of evidence of their innocence. When capital punishment is concerned, most Americans believe our criminal system is close to infallible. Many assume that if factual errors do occur at trial, they will be discovered and corrected by higher courts. People believe that the innocent are rarely wrongly convicted and they are certainly not executed. Unfortunately, there is a large numbers of innocents people who

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Better Essays

    The death penalty has always been a controversial topic in the United States. It is outlawed in 16 states, but it should be abolished in all fifty states. The act of the death penalty is irrational, costly, inhumane, and religiously immoral. Taking an individual’s life, because he/she murdered someone is senseless and is not a good representation of the United States.…

    • 1980 Words
    • 8 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    The debate over whether or not capital punishment should be used has gone on for thousands of years. Although the method of capital punishment has changed the idea of it has not. Capital punishment will always have its disadvantages and its advantages. There has always been an intense debate among the people regarding the constitutionality of capital punishment. In my opinion, capital punishment should only be used in harsh cases that the convicted person is proven guilty in.…

    • 78 Words
    • 1 Page
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Better Essays

    Capital punishment has been around for thousands of years and to this day we still use some of the forms. It has been heavily reformed so that is a quick, humane, and effective way of execution. A person has to do a horrendous crime such as murder, or kidnapping where the victim dies for the death penalty to be an option when other alternatives such as life in prison with or without the possibility of parole are not sufficient. Even though many do not agree there are a numerous amount of people that do not agree with capital punishment and it may continue to change, it is a necessity for this…

    • 1322 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Rogerian and Toulmin

    • 404 Words
    • 2 Pages

    Capital punishment has been around for decades and continues to alter as awareness of its negative connotations rise. Even in the late 1800’s we saw people trying to adjust the act in an attempt to make it more humane, but the reality is that there is no “humane” way of ending another’s life.…

    • 404 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Better Essays

    Phil 1112 Death Penalty

    • 1930 Words
    • 8 Pages

    “An eye for an eye,” right? As fair as America tries to be, sometimes we also have to remember that an eye for an eye makes the whole world blind. Many people rave about how the death penalty is an unjust punishment and that we can do without it; the idea of killing someone so that the punishment fits the crime is what shows how our world and societies are just as cruel as the criminals in it. The death penalty debate is a dispute that is learning to become more immoral and becoming a less used tactic when penalizing criminals. This problem has decreased significantly over the last couple decades but the controversy is still up in the air nearly everywhere. Additionally, much of the controversy has a heavy influence on biomedical research due to the fact that lethal injection is highly used for execution purposes. Currently many professionals are looking for other forms of punishment, yet there are still many people who believe that this is a fair and equal punishment. Regardless of which side one is on, both perspectives offer good reasoning to why or why not the death penalty should continue to stay in effect. Althought I do not agree with the death many and it’s many consequences, I understand the reason for it being so controversial.…

    • 1930 Words
    • 8 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Better Essays

    Apart from a short time in the mid-to-late 20th century when a freeze on capital punishment was ordered by the U.S. Supreme Court, this system of punishment has been in constant use in the United States for most of its history. Proponents and opponents have always been at odds over whether the practice should be continued or abolished completely. Lining up on one side are those who believe that the practice deters crime and is cheaper than warehousing a criminal for life in a maximum-security prison and lining up on the other side are those that believe the practice is inhumane and fraught with inconsistencies which make it antiquated and a barbaric form of punishment. Even though the United States…

    • 1187 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Good Essays

    The death penalty is a major topic for debate Shannon Rafferty defends in her portfolio published by Penn State entitled “Death Penalty Persuasive Essay.” She believes the penalty should be allowed because it functions as a deterrent, it provides society retribution and it is morally just. Olivia H. disagrees with use of the death penalty in her essay “Capital Punishment Is Dead wrong.” She tells about the risk of punishing the innocent, and how the states are doing irreversible acts of crime. As the authors disagree about whether the death penalty should be allowed, they have some common ground when it comes to admitting the potential for human error and in both disagreeing to the use of barbaric punishments by the government.…

    • 413 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    When understanding criminal law it is important to consider the positive and negative effects that different punishment alternatives can have. Over the last century the use of capital punishment, the legal process for which an individual is sentence to death when found guilty of committing a crime, has been a subject debated back and forth between government parties on its effectiveness. Many people believe that the issues of fairness, constitutionality, morality of an individual’s life, and potential of convicting the innocent are too important to allow the use of the…

    • 2611 Words
    • 11 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Good Essays

    Capital punishment is outdated, irreversible, hypocritical, and ineffective and deterring criminals, and should therefore be abolished. There are many things wrong with executing criminals, but some of the most compelling reasons are these: it is barbaric, does not positively affect murder rates, and to put it simply, two wrongs do not make a right.…

    • 863 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    The death penalty has been a criminal sentence imposed in America for hundreds of years, but it have been extremely controversial as Evan Mandery illustrates in “A Wild Justice: The Death and Resurrection of Capital Punishment in America.” Today, the death sentence is strictly used in murder cases and in thirty-two out of the fifty states in America. In these states, it is completely legal to use the ultimate punishment of death to incapacitate a criminal from committing any further harm to society. Throughout American history, many individuals have supported the death penalty because they believe it is an effective way to deter crime and is a form of retribution. Others have strongly advocated against capital punishment because it is not morally correct and it not applied fairly. Also, some argue that it is unconstitutional to use the death penalty because it violates the cruel and unusual punishment provision of the Eight Amendment written in the United States Constitution.…

    • 1037 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    The United States stands apart from the general trends on capital punishment. It is the only Western industrialized nation where executions still take place. Furthermore, it is the only nation that combines frequent executions with a highly developed legal system characterized by respect for individual rights.…

    • 880 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Meme

    • 623 Words
    • 3 Pages

    More than half of the states in our country use this barbaric technique of delivering justice. The death penalty is a very controversial topic so some people's stands on the death penalty might be different from others. But, there are many facts that show the gruesome nature of the death penalty as well as how unneccessary it is. All of the collected evidence about the death penalty proves how bad of a punishment it really is to us against criminals, a much more reasonable punishment would be a life sentence in prison.…

    • 623 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Better Essays

    Death Penalty

    • 4048 Words
    • 17 Pages

    Thesis: Capital punishment is useless as a deterrent, morally indefensible, discriminatory in practice, and prone to errors that may have led to the execution of wrongfully convicted people. Its continuing legality in the United States is critically undermining American moral stature around the world. The Supreme Court should bring the United States in line with the rest of the civilized world and hold that death is a cruel and unusual punishment prohibited by the Eighth Amendment. Summary: The death penalty process consumes tremendous amounts of money and resources and fails to deter criminal activity. It is not uniformly applied geographically, and where it is allowed, it is used in an often arbitrary and racist manner. As a result, states have been curtailing the use of the death penalty, the Supreme Court has limited its application, and both death sentences and executions are down sharply. This is at odds with the recent efforts of some states to expand the range of capital crimes, and with national polls which still reflect a clear majority of Americans favor capital punishment. Meanwhile, momentum has been accelerating in the international community to abolish the death penalty, and the United States is increasingly criticized for failing to keep in step with other civilized nations in this area. Capital Punishment in the United States Since the 1977 resumption of capital punishment in the United States, nearly 1,100 convicted prisoners have been put to death in the thirty-eight US states where the practice remains legal. As of the beginning of 2007, approximately 3,350 people remain on death row in American prisons. In recent years, the evidence has shown that the death penalty process consumes tremendous amounts of money and resources and fails to deter criminals. FBI Uniform Crime…

    • 4048 Words
    • 17 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Good Essays

    Did you know that 1,432 people have been executed since 1976? Capital punishment, aka the death penalty has claimed countless lived since it’s establishment in the United States in 1608. Executions happen pretty often, with 38 people being killed last year alone. The death penalty is an unnecessary and horrible punishment which should not be allowed.…

    • 488 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    The death penalty, also known as capital punishment, is an execution used as a punishment on someone convicted of a capital crime. There are several ways in which these executions have been or are being made. The most common is the lethal injection, others being electrocution, hanging, lethal gas, gas chamber, and/ or the firing squad under limited circumstances. The death penalty was first used in the U.S. in colonial times therefore leading to more than 900 executions since the year of 1976 in the U.S., with the state of Texas leading the nation (“At Issue”). There are many pros and cons that are discussed about this topic that are justifiable depending on the different points of view. Some people believe that the death…

    • 1261 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Powerful Essays