Abolish Capital Punishment

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change and reinforces the idea that killing is a reasonable response to those who have wronged us.

There are costs, for example to maintain state of the art execution techniques and personnel and huge costs in terms of the inevitable series of appeals through the court system.

The death penalty is prone to being unfairly administered. Many argue that those facing capital punishment are not the worst offenders but merely the ones who may suffer from prejudice against them with the fewest resources to defend themselves.

No justice system is infallible. There are many instances where the wrong people have been convicted and killed, by us, the state.

According to Glen Stassen in The death penalty is Losing (2008) In Georgia, you are 4.3 times more likely to be sentenced to death for killing a white person than for killing a black. Similarly in Oklahoma, Illinois, Florida, Mississippi, North Carolina, and Alabama. Since 1976, fifteen whites have been executed for killing a black person in the United States; 283 blacks for killing a white victim. A Stanford University study concluded that the blacker you look the more likely you are to be executed.

III. Alternatives to capital punishment

The existence of a stringent life sentence can either partially or completely eliminate the imagined need for the death penalty. In some states, a life without parole sentence is used as an option when the death penalty is not selected; in other states, like Michigan and Massachusetts, it exists as a complete replacement to capital punishment.

According to the Savannah news Press restitution is requiring those who have committed murder to make some monetary restitution to the family of the victim is strongly supported by those choosing alternatives to the death penalty. However, this sanction has not yet been widely employed by states. Inmates generally receive little in the way of remuneration for work performed in prison, usually barely enough for cigarettes or candy. A requirement of restitution might mean raising the pay for prison work. Nevertheless, the various opinion polls discussed above show that a requirement of restitution is one of the most consistent demands by those preferring alternatives to the death penalty.

Conclusion:

Summary: Today I have discussed the problems related to capital punishment, offered solutions, helped you see how much better America would be, and persuaded you to agree that abolishing capital punishment is the right thing to do.

Closing Statement: America may now be ready to abandon the death penalty.

Bibliography

DAVIS, David Brion. "Movement to Abolish Capital Punishment in America, 1787-1861." American Historical Review, vol. 63, Oct. 1957, pp. 23-46. EBSCOhost, hindscc.idm.oclc.org/login?url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=hus&AN=520526524&site=eds-live.

Evans, Kimberly Masters. Capital Punishment : Cruel and Unusual?. Detroit : Gale Cengage Learning, [2010], 2010. Information Plus reference series. EBSCOhost, hindscc.idm.oclc.org/login?url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=cat01533a&AN=hcc.u183151&site=eds-live.

Pepper, John, et al. Deterrence and the Death Penalty. National Academies Press, 2012. EBSCOhost, hindscc.idm.oclc.org/login?url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=nlebk&AN=457909&site=eds-live.

Savannah News-Press, Mar. 23, 1986, at 7C, (quoted in Paduano & Smith, Deathly Errors: Juror Misperceptions Concerning Parole in the Imposition of the Death Penalty, 18 Columbia Human Rights Law Review 211, 213, n.4 (1987)

Stassen, Glen. "The Death Penalty Is Losing." Tikkun, vol. 23, no. 4, Jul/Aug2008, pp. 43-47. EBSCOhost, hindscc.idm.oclc.org/login?url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=lfh&AN=33293905&site=eds-live.

W. Bowers & M. Vandiver, People Want an Alternative to the Death Penalty: A New Look at Public Opinion, Jan. 15, 1993.