The Death Penalty Essay, Research Paper

Death penalty brutalizes us. Every human being deserves the dignity of

life. This includes the most brutal of murderers and insane killers. Premeditated,

state sanctioned killing is not justifiable under any circumstances. Death penalty in an indication of how little our government values human life.

Capital punishment is cruel, both physically and psychologically. People have been executed who might have been innocent. The death penalty is not applied consistently, and it also discriminates against minorities and the poor. The average capital dependant doesn t have the money to hire O J Simpson s dream team .

The electric chair is the most gruesome methods of execution currently practiced in the US. Although hanging and the gas chamber are capable of producing excruciating pain as well. Lethal injections are also being practiced but the torture that death penalty brings about cannot be taken out. The conscious human beings that are being put to death die a thousand times before they die, just imagining the torture that they will be put through.

There are plenty of politicians ready to exploit capital punishment. Kirk Fordice promised in his campaign that he would make Mississippi the capital of capital punishment -The Atlantic reported. Also, Kentucky governor Paul Patton signed five execution warrants on his second day in office, though all five cases were still pending in court.

A burgeoning global movement is harshly critical of the US on the issue of death penalty. The European Union has called on the US to end the practice. So has the Inter-American Court on Human Rights.

US religious leaders also have taken a strong stand against death penalty. We oppose capital punishment not just for what it does to those guilty of horrible crimes, but for what it does to all of us as a society says a march 1999 joint statement by US Jewish and Catholic leaders.

We cannot over come crime by simply executing criminals, nor can we restore the lives of the innocently ending the lives of those convicted of their murders. The death penalty offers the tragic illusion that we defend life by taking life.

The government does not have the right to kill, except in self-defense, as in a policeman firing on an armed and dangerous criminal. Also there is no difference between state killing and an individual killing. The result is the same another dead body, one more set of grieving parents, one more cemetery slot.

Every time a person is executed, we send out the most profound message of cynicism about the value of human life. Every time a person is executed, we as a society sink to the same level as that of the common killer.

The methods of execution have all been found to be extremely and excessively cruel. It often takes ten minutes or more to die in the electric chair. The only method that is known to be less painful and drawn out is lethal injection, about which we know very little at all.

Of all the countries that still permit death penalty, only five use lethal injection, seventy three use firing squads, fifty eight hang condemned criminals, six stone them, and three still use beheading.

US is the only western nation that still allows the death penalty, and we also have one of the highest crime rates.

We are a nation that prides itself on the basic principals of justice, liberty and we are the first ones to speak out against torture and killings by foreign governments. It is time that we look in the mirror.

Many of those on death row may no longer be a threat to society, but for those who are there are options less cruel and unusual that don t put society at risk. Life without parole is one. A lengthy sentence with treatment with release conditional upon rehabilitation is another. Death penalty is an act of distilled hatred and it should be abandoned.