Death Penalty Acts As A Deterrent example essay topic

There are many reasons to both support and oppose the death penalty. Many people can feel very strongly about whether or not they approve of this method of punishment. I feel that the death penalty is wrong, and I believe that there is much support to back this up. I believe that the death penalty is wrong because it is not an effective deterrent, racially and economically bias, unreliable, expensive, and morally wrong of society. One argument from death penalty supporters is that the death penalty acts as a deterrent to prevent other people from committing murders.

It is the belief that people will think out the consequences of their actions before murdering, and consider the death penalty not a reasonable consequence and thus not commit the crime. This, however, is intrinsically flawed. Most murderers or potential murderers do not usually take into account life in prison or the death penalty. There are many reasons for people to not consider the death penalty before committing the crime. The person would not consider it if they did not believe they would be caught, if it was done in a moment of anger, or if they were under the influence of alcohol or drugs which will cause them to act impulsively.

In fact, some criminologists, such as William Bowers of Northeastern University, believe that the death penalty actually hurts society and increases the chances of murder. There is lack of evidence that the death penalty is a deterrent. Some countries in Europe and Canada that do not have the death penalty have lower murder rates than the US, the same holds true for US states that do not have the death penalty. There are many variables that go into deciding if a person will or will not get the death penalty. I feel that there are too many bias and variables to say that the penalty is dealt out fairly. The people who are up for capital punishment and cannot afford their own attorney are assigned one by the state, which may be of much lower effectiveness than one could afford with much financial backing.

According to the Michigan State webpage: 'Since the death penalty was reinstated in 1976,158 black defendants have been executed for the murder of a white victim, while only 11 white defendants have been executed for the murder of a black victim'. This is a clear indication that the penalty is racially bias. The taking of a person's life is unreliable and once a mistake is made, nothing can be done to make up for it, because you have taken the person's life. Current statistics show that for every 7 people executed one has been released from death row. One in seven does not sound like never good consistency to me, and how many of the 6 still executed could still be innocent?

I feel that the death of innocents cannot be justified by the death penalty. A recent study at Columbia University found that two thirds of capital cases had serious errors in them, two thirds does not sound like a very consistent number that I would be comfortable using in deciding if people live or die. The advent of DNA testing has shown that we have people on death row who have not committed the crime they have been accused of. Many people argue that it is best to just execute those convicted of murder to save money and un crowd our jails. Many people fail to realize that because of the unlimited and automatic appeal system it is about ten times more expensive to execute someone than to lock them up for the rest of their lives. Because we live in a civilized society, we should take a more thought out look at the process of retribution besides an immediate eye for an eye mentality.

We should hold ourselves to higher standards than emotionally revenge seeking people who lose the value of the life of a human, murderer or not. There is a great example and quote from the Michigan State website: 'For example, Bud Welch's daughter, Julie, was killed in the Oklahoma City bombing in 1995. Although his first reaction was to wish that those who committed this terrible crime be killed, he ultimately realized that such killing 'is simply vengeance; and it was vengeance that killed Julie... Vengeance is a strong and natural emotion. But it has no place in our justice system.

' ' I think that the quote perfectly illustrates why the death penalty has no place in our civilized country. As you can see, I am clearly against the use of the death penalty. I believe that any advantages that it poses are cancelled out by the large number of disadvantages that the system sets up. It has very little effect on deterring criminals because they do not clearly think out what they are doing and weight the consequences, is clearly economically and racial biased due to the randomness of lawyers for the poor and juries more likely to convict the murderers of whites, unreliable because of the number of innocent people on death row, expensive because of the constant legal fees from appeals, and morally wrong of society to demand eye for an eye justice..