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Abolish The Death Penalty Should Not Be Abolished

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Wiggins Amanda
Professor Laudani
Composition 1
09 July 2015
Abolish the Death Penalty Since the state has no power to give life, it should not exercise its power to take a life either. After all, the judicial system is not a fool-proof system. The risk of putting an innocent human being to death by capital punishment, cannot be ruled out. The only purpose it serves is retribution or revenge. Therefore, the death penalty must be abolished. The death penalty is prone to errors that may have led to the execution of wrongfully convicted people. There have been 330 post-conviction DNA exonerations here in the U.S (Innocence Project).
The Supreme Court should bring the United States in line with the rest of the world and hold that death is a cruel and unusual punishment prohibited by the Eighth Amendment. The death penalty process consumes tremendous amounts of money and resources and fails to deter murders.

The average cost to put someone to death is 1.1 million dollars that Americans are paying for (Huddar, Buzzle). That money can be used for a lot more things, such as, helping homeless veterans, who served our country, or children who live in poverty right here in America. It is used in an often arbitrary and racist manner. In a study commissioned by the governor of Maryland, defendants who kill white victims were more likely to be sentenced to death than those who killed a black (McElwee, Huffington Post) Not only does the death penalty

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