Reform The Death Penalty Essay, Research Paper

1AC

Since our nation s founding, crime has been punished with the ultimate sanction: death. More than 13,000 people have been legally executed since colonial times, and most of these executions have taken place in the southern states. QUOTE:

Now, it is because my partner and I agree with this that we stand affirmative on Resolved: That the State of Florida should significantly reform the use of the death penalty. For clarity of debate we offer the following definitions:

h Significantly- meaningfully, importantly

h Reform- make or better especially by concerning/correcting bad habits

All definitions were taken from the Merriam Webster Dictionary.

By the end of this debate it will be clear that Florida s correctional system is not fulfilling its main goals of

1. Maintaining an effective correctional system

2. Punishing ??? those who commit unforgivable acts and

3. Providing non-discriminatory sentencing.

We will prove that these principal objectives have not been attained through

Contention 1: Florida s use of the current death penalty maintains far too many detrimental effects.

Let us take, for example, the case of Jess Taedro and Pedro Medina [http://www.fccstate.fl us/fcc/reports/methods/emdpfla.html]

OR

Let us take, for example, the case of Stephen McCoy. Given the lethal injection as his method of execution, Stephen was forced to slowly choke and heave for several minutes before dying, because the dosage of lethal drugs was too weak. Another example, in Texas, a blundered execution occurred because the tube attached to the needle in the person s arm leaked and sprayed noxious chemicals toward witnesses. Similar botches are found in the other methods of execution, including the wrong length of rope used in hanging, bad aim by the firing squad, and gases mixing and escaping inside gas chambers.

What is the purpose of these anecdotes? It is to prove that the current death penalty not only has flukes in which the objection is sometimes not achieved, but it also creates further problems.

Let us now consider

Contention 2: Strict procedures have not eliminated discrimination in death sentencing.

It is common belief that the death penalty is reserved for those who commit the most horrible of crimes. But let s face reality. According to the American Civil Liberties Union of Florida, only a small percentage of death sentenced inmates were convicted of unusually vicious crimes. The vast majority of individuals facing execution were convicted of crimes committed by others who are serving mere prison sentences; crimes such as murder committed in the course of an armed robbery. Therefore, because the death penalty is clearly not given to the criminals who are most deserving, it is evident the fatal sentence is handed out arbitrarily. As one witness put it so eloquently, The death penalty is like a lottery, in which fairness always loses.

This notion now brings me to my third and final point:

Contention 3:

In 1990, the Government Accounting Office reported evidence that a convict s race, as well as the race of the victim, influences imposition of the death penalty. The GAO found that those who murdered whites were 82% more likely to be sentenced to death than those who murdered black. 82 percent. Let us now consider another statistic. The United States Population is approximately 12% African American. Yet, of the almost 4,000 people executed in the past 70 years, more than 50% have been black. The numbers and statistics speak for themselves. Other minorities are also death sentenced disproportionately to their numbers in the population. These statistics prove the death penalty s sentencing is unbalanced and discrimatory.

Therefore, we propose the following plan:

Plank 1: The plan shall be called:

Plank 2: Equipment used during execution will be subject to practiced examiners.

Plank 3: There shall be no unnecessary guests at the actual execution.

Plank 4: There must be two professional witnesses besides the executioner to attend to and record the execution.

Plank 5: At all executions there must be a person of medical knowledge and degree present, and for execution by lethal injection, the injection shall be given by a physician.

?? Plank 6: Funding will be provided by

In the late nineteenth century, there was a movement from local to state administration of capital punishment. This transition to state authority evolved slowly from the first state-imposed execution in 1864 through the 1880s. Most of the change occurred between the 1880s and 1910s.

We must continue to move forward in this evolution. Our case advocates this reformation and improvement of capital punishment.

I now stand ready for cross-examination.