The Death Penalty Should Not Be Legal

America is within the top four countries for the number of executions due to the death penalty since 1999. Citing the, “Amnesty International in For What Tomorrow (2004), more than 1,800 people were executed in 31 countries, the vast majority of these in China (1076), Iran (165), Saudi Arabia (103), and then the United States (98)” (NAAS, 43). The death penalty is currently an intense debate involving the idea of whether or not we as people should be able to sentence another person to death. According to the ethical and moral reasoning of the philosophers Jeremy Bentham, Peter Singer, and Hugo Bedau, the death penalty should not be a legal punishment.

Capital punishment is the punishment of a heinous crime like murder. It is being used now in some states and has also been used in the ancient times. Thirteen states right now don’t have the death penalty: Alaska, District of Colombia, Hawaii, Iowa, Maine, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, North Dakota, Rhode Island, Vermont, West Virginia, and Wisconsin. But all states should ban it because the American Civil Liberties Union believes the death penalty inherently violates the constitutional ban against cruel and unusual punishment and the guarantees of due process of law and of equal protection under the law. Capital punishment is an intolerable denial of civil liberties and is inconsistent with the fundamental values of our democratic

Many call the death penalty inhumane, and a large number of countries no longer execute criminals. However, the U.S. has kept capital punishment because it deters criminals from committing murders that place them in the position of the death penalty. However, the death penalty is wrong. No one deserves to have their life taken away by another human, even if they are guilty of murder.

There have been 1466 executions in the United States since 1976. This was the year that the supreme court reinstated the death penalty. They maintained that is was constitutional under the 8th amendment. The death penalty has been around since the beginning of the United States. Although there have been many debates and changes made the death penalty is still used today. The death penalty should stay legal. It should be used for only the most terrible crimes. If there is no serious punishment for serious crimes people are more likely to commit them.

In September, 1983, 11 year old Sabrina Buie was found dead. She had been beaten, raped, and suffocated. The police received a confession from 19 year old Henry Lee McCollum and 15 year old Leon Brown. Both were convicted and were sentenced to death. After spending 30 years in prison, the men were released because they were proven innocent. Another man was responsible for the crime, his name was Roscoe Artis. Henry and Leon gave false confessions, and they currently have maintained their innocence ("The Innocent on Death Row"). Capital punishment has always been an issue for a multitude of reasons. Two innocent men were almost killed because of official error and misconduct. Although the death penalty can sometimes be justifiable based on crimes, the death penalty should be illegal in the United States.

In 1972, the United States Supreme Court ruled that the death penalty was unconstitutional, removing over 600 prisoners from death row. The justices described the application of the death penalty as arbitrarily, random, and discriminatory. Justice Potter Stewart remarked that the death penalty like being “struck by lightning” and that “if society 's ultimate punishment cannot be applied fairly, it should not be applied at all” ¹. Of the 22,000 homicides committed every year, less than 100 people are sentenced to death, and politics, the quality of legal counsel, and where the crime was committed are often more determining factors than the crime itself ². The race of the victim has also been found to influence the likelihood of receiving the death penalty even today. Despite all these reasons, in 1978 the United States Supreme Court declared that the death penalty would no longer violate the Constitution under a two-stage trial system even though it made no real changes. Capital punishment today is an offense just as immoral, arbitrary, and illogical as it was and has been since the beginning of time.

The death penalty has been around legally in the United States since the early 1970s. It has been used to execute those who have committed terrible crimes like murder or terrorism. Many people feel that this is a good way of bringing the families of the victims closure and making our streets safer to live on. While this may be true, it is hard to ignore the fact that many innocent people have been killed because of wrongful convictions. Through DNA testing and other evidence, the courts are finding people who have been convicted for a crime are actually innocent. The death penalty has killed over thousands of people who have committed terrible heinous crimes. It has gotten these people out of our streets and into prisons or even out of this world for good. Many people in America find this to be very pleasing and beneficial to the states and country because it is one less criminal we will have to worry about. Even though the death penalty takes many dangerous people out of our streets, it should be abolished because of the number of innocent people that have been on Death Row or are still on it.

Madison Hobley was sentenced to death based on a coerced confession. He was wrongly accused of starting a fire, which killed his wife and child and some others (Six). He was tortured by the police, they hand cuffed him to a wall ring and beat him, then he was taken downtown, where he was handcuffed to a chair and kicked by Sgt. Patrick Garrity (Six). Then they suffocated him with a typewriter cover until he blacked out (Six). Hobley never confessed and nor was he evidence proven that he did it was valid (Six). In 2002 there was hearing that discovered evidence that the jury was intimidated and that the gas canister they said he bought was actually put at the crime scene and had no signs of being burned (Six). Mobley was on death row

In America, when someone is convicted of murder, they are put on trial to receive the death penalty. Some say it is what they deserve, while others say that it is a “cruel and unusual”punishment. States, such as New Jersey, have already banned the penalty, but some states are still pending on whether to have the penalty or to follow New Jersey’s path .

Executing people for what they have done; homicide, kidnapping, illegal injection and so, has been a “vast” object at issue for years, since it is seen as a cruel, vicious way of punishment. Nevertheless, among numerous countries, states and ultimately, the public, death warrant has been attempted continuously while insisting it is brutal, but mostly; found that it can literally prevent people from committing a crime. Moreover, harshness is considered as the only way of hampering humanity from killing each other, but it actually is not. In spite of capital punishment, life parole is a nice way of incarcerate people, and there is a possibility of discharge. Discharge can be exceptional as people have the grasp to profit from

Kelly Gissendaner was executed March 7th 2015 at 7 p.m. (Eastern Time). She was sentenced to death for the planning of her husband’s death in 1997 (“Georgia”). Gissendaner’s boyfriend joined in the murder of her husband. Her execution denoted the first time Georgia has executed a woman in over seventy years. According to Simpson, “The death penalty is punishment of execution, administered to someone legally convicted of a capital crime” (Oxford Dictionaries). Since the early days of human civilization, the death penalty has been around. Individuals and associations have been deciding on this theme for just as long; there are two difficult decisions on the inquiry. The first

Capital Punishment is still used in the United States, and there has been 152 people that has been released from death row since 1973. There has been many more people that were not released but executed and possibly innocent. Kantian ethics is the theory that says the moral actions are not determined by the consequences but by the right nature of the action. Capital punishment may be questionable with some cases of innocents, with that being said the use of capital punishment should only be used with cases to be absolute guilt.

Abortion is a sin. The death penalty should be abolished. Donald Trump will make America great again. Fairlife is better than Trumoo. I don’t necessarily agree with all of these statements, but they are all widely discussed topics today. Did any of the comments make you feel uneasy?

The death penalty has been a contentious topic in America. Attempts to abolish the death penalty date back to the colonial era. In the late 18th century, some states had removed the death penalty for every crime except murder; in the 1800’s some states used the death penalty for treason, rape, and insubordination in the south before the Civil War (Jost “Death Penalty Debates” 974). The abolitionist movement in the 19th century was the most influential; opponents of the death penalty during the progressive era would

human rights that are 8th and 14th amendment away. From the death penalty, many innocent