Hey Everyone: This Capital Punishment Right?

hey everyone: thIs Capital Punishment Right?

Capital punishment is a controversial topic in American society today. It is a penalty of death for the offenses of treason, murder, kidnapping, selling drugs, rape, armed robbery, burglary, arson and train wrecking. In addition, whenever a criminal is apprehended, he or she must received a fair trial and be punished according to his crime. However, some people contend that since murder is the worst crime, the extreme penalty should be extended "in retaliation." After such a crime has already been committed, would a death penalty of the murderer really satisfy as revenge? I personally feel a criminal must be penalized but capital punishment is senseless, demonstrable, and as cruel as a coldblooded murder. This form of punishment has been an injustice for too long and it needs to change.

Voltaire wrote, "It is better to risk saving a guilty person than to condemn an innocent one," (Voltaire 387) and it is impossible to feel otherwise about capital punishment. The most important idea that I extremely dislike about the system is its irrevocability. It is horrifying to contemplate a system where the state deprived a criminal of the opportunity to correct its errors: a dead man cannot be given back his life. If for no other reason, the practice of sentencing men to life imprisonment should be substituted for the death penalty. A man, imprisoned unjustly, can always be released; a life once taken, however, can never be returned.

It has been said that capital punishment is very effective as a deterrent to murder. Many people think that fear of the extreme penalty might serve as a warning and check other would-be offenders. This is not always true. According to recent survey conducted by MSNBC, "Many criminals do not think of the punishment while they are committing a crime. They are confident of their ability to avoid detection (MSNBC 12)." On the other hand, most people will agree that kill or the desire to do so is not normal. The person who kills may very well be either mentally ill or disturbed. Institutions offer proper treatment and guidance to psychologically remold criminals. They can be assisted to learn the advantages of a law abiding existence. If given a chance to live either in or out of jail, they may become a benefit to mankind. An example of this situation is Robert Straum, better known as the "Bird man of Alcatraz." He became a prominent authority on bird diseases through reading while in prison.

There are reasons why one could favor capital punishment, but these suffer a fatal weakness of either logic or feeling. The major claim of those who support the system is that it serves as a deterrent to crime. For instance, when a man plans to commit a murder, and he realizes the penalty for the murder is death, he will usually hesitate in executing that plan; however, if he realizes that the death

...