Cesare Beccaria's Argument Against The Death Penalty

The legitimacy of the use of capital punishment has been tarnished by its widespread misuse , which has clouded our judgment regarding the justifiability of the death penalty as a punitive measure. However, the problems with capital punishment, such as the “potential error, irreversibility, arbitrariness and racial skew" , are not a basis for its abolition, as the world of homicide suffer from these problems more acutely. To tackle this question, one must disregard the currently blemished universal status quo and purely assess the advantages and disadvantages of the death penalty as a punitive measure. Through unprejudiced examination of the death penalty and its consequential impacts, it is evident that it is a punishment that effectively serves its retributive, denunciatory, deterrent, and incapacitative goals.

Throughout the history of man there has always existed a sort of rule pertaining to retribution for just and unjust acts. For the just came rewards, and for the unjust came punishments. This has been a law as old as time. One philosophy about the treatment of the unjust is most controversial in modern time and throughout our history; which is is the ethical decision of a death penalty. This controversial issue of punishment by death has been going on for centuries. It dates back to as early as 399 B.C.E., to when Socrates was forced to drink hemlock for his “corruption of the youth” and “impiety”.

The way that we deal with criminals today is center and established based on how Cesare Beccaria defined and stated it. Who is Cesare Beccaria? Cesare Beccaria is an Italian scholar born in Milan, Lombardy, Italy on Saturday March 14, 1738. He died at the age of 56 in the same city on Friday, November 28, 1794. Cesare Beccaria was an Italian criminologist, a jurist, a philosopher, and a politician who is widely considered as the most talented jurist [3] and one of the greatest thinkers of the Age of Enlightenment. Recognized to be one of the fathers of classical criminal theory and modern penology, he is well remembered for his writings on “On Crimes and Punishments” written in 1764, which condemned torture and the death penalty, and was a founding work in the field of penology and the Classical school of criminology by promoting criminal justice. (citation)

Think about it, in some situations, we are people killing people because they killed people. Confusing, I know, but it makes sense. There is also the fact that the death penalty violates what the U.S. was built upon, the Constitution. According to the eight amendment, “excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted” and last time I checked, capital punishment is a cruel and unusual punishment that resulted in the death of so many people. It proves that the death penalty is unconstitutional and is an inhumane punishment that is forced upon many. Also, the fact that some states in the United States allow capital punishment is duplicitous. Our government allows it in certain places, yet based on one of our amendments; it should not be allowed whatsoever because it really is a “cruel and unusual

Why is the death penalty used as a means of punishment for crime? Is this just a way to solve the nations growing problem of overcrowded prisons, or is justice really being served? Why do some view the taking of a life morally correct? These questions are discussed and debated upon in every state and national legislature throughout the country. Advantages and disadvantages for the death penalty exist, and many members of the United States, and individual State governments, have differing opinions. Yet it seems that the stronger arguments, and evidence such as cost effectiveness, should lead the common citizen to the opposition of Capital Punishment.

The debate on whether or not the death penalty should be abolished has been ongoing for quite a long period of time. While there are those who believe that the death penalty does not serve its intended purpose, proponents of the same are convinced that the relevance of the same cannot be overstated and hence it should not be abolished. In this text, I examine the arguments for and against the death penalty.

The federal government has an obligation to make just laws. Currently, US laws allow for the death penalty for certain heinous crimes. The supporters argue that the 5th Amendment, which guarantees that no one shall be deprived of "life, liberty, or property, without due process of law,” implies that depriving someone of his or her life is permissible under the constitution as long as there is due process. However, there are several reasons why the federal government must abolish the death penalty - it weakens US moral authority over other nations; there have been too many wrongful convictions for death penalty in the US; the death penalty is in conflict with the 8th amendment of the US constitution; and finally, the cost of death penalty

Cesare Beccaria is the “Father of Classical Criminology” and justified punishment on the principle of utility. Beccaria focused on reforming the Criminal Justice System and believed that punishment should be for the better good for society, as well as the individual, and deter others from committing crime and prevent criminals from recommitting crime. He believes effective punishment must certain, swift, and severe to get the desired effect on society and the offender (Robert, Cullen, and Ball 2015). He is also the author of his book Of Crime and Punishment, which discussed his philosophy on the purposes

     The death penalty is absolutely outrageous. There is no real reason that the government should feel that it has the right to execute people. Capital punishment is murder just as much as the people being executed murdered. The is no need for the death penalty and it needs to be abolished. It goes against the Constitution which states that there will be no cruel and unusual punishment. There is nothing crueler than killing a person.

In the United States, the use of the death penalty continues to be a controversial issue. Every election year, politicians, wishing to appeal to the moral sentiments of voters, routinely compete with each other as to who will be toughest in extending the death penalty to those persons who have been convicted of first-degree murder. Both proponents and opponents of capital punishment present compelling arguments to support their claims. Often their arguments are made on different interpretations of what is moral in a just society. In this essay, I intend to present major arguments of those who support the death penalty and those who are opposed to state sanctioned executions application . However, I do intend to fairly and accurately

This paper defines and analyzes Beccaria's concept of deterrence and the three key elements of punishment. The concept of deterrence is a classical school and rational choice model that emphasis punishment in order to deter crime. The three key elements of punishment used in order to deter crime include: the swiftness of punishment, the certainty of punishment, and the severity of punishment. It discusses which of these elements Beccaria thought was the most and least important, as well as my personal opinions. Also included in this paper are real-life examples of deterrence and the elements of punishment that they use.

While criminals must be punished for their criminal actions, “legalized murder”, as author Coretta Scott King put it, is immoral. The death penalty is legalizing the very thing that many on death row are charged for, murder. There is a multitude of lawful alternatives, to the death penalty, of reestablishing a better reputation for the criminals. The Constitution has no true right to allow such a felonious form of rehabilitation.

It is better to try and prevent crimes than it is to punish them, this is achieved by good legislation which guides men to their greatest, or least unhappiness possible (Beccaria, 1767). As mentioned previously, Beccaria’s utilitarian ideology has shaped the justice system in western societies for many decades. Therefore, Beccaria can be described as a very influential thinker. Without his contribution we could still have a system of capital punishment, and that is a worrying thought. However, we now seem fixed with utilitarian justice. It may be argued that it is now time to move towards restorative justice. There are also those such as Tullock (1974), who argue for a return to harsher sentencing. Some states in the US still consider the death penalty to be a legitimate punishment. So it can be said that Beccaria is undoubtedly a key thinker in criminology, but as with all key thinkers he is not without his critics.

This paper is on the Classical School theory that emerged in the eighteenth century; two writes of this period were Cesare Beccaria and Jeremy Bentham. Among the major ideas that descend from this theory are the concepts of humans as free-willed, rational beings, utilitarianism (the greatest good for the greatest number), civil rights and due process of law, rules of evidence and testimony, determinate sentencing, and deterrence. The writes during this period examined not only human nature but also social conditions as well. The Classical School, gave us a humanistic conception of how law and criminal justice system should be constructed. Law was to protect the rights of both society and individual, and its chief purpose was to deter criminal behavior, the law emphasized moral responsibility and the duty of citizens to consider full the consequences of behavior before they acted. This thinking required humans possessing free will and a rations nature.

According to this article “How the Death Penalty Saves Lives” by David B, Muhlhausen the death death penalty is more widely agreed upon that it should be in place than it shouldn’t. The author makes the argument that with the death penalty in place it deters the crimes that have this punishment from happening. He also argues about how the constitution plays a role but how it supports it. He claims that it uphold constitutional protections such as due process and equal protection of law. Muhlhausen believes the death penalty should be in place simply because there are more Americans for it than against it. He believes that this should be in place because it is what America wants and the constitution supports it through the constitutional protections of due process, and equal protection of law.Muhlhausen has many main points similar to Greenberg but Muhlhausen doesn’t have as much evidence or support to back up all of his arguments. He has some strong points but it could be supported better.