Synthesis Essay On Capital Punishment

Is each person defined by the worst thing that they have done? Can we as a society approve of hunting down and attacking the most vulnerable of people due to their vulnerability? Is it acceptable for the law to determine who deserves to die and who doesn’t? “Just Mercy” prompts its readers to explore these questions and many more. In this book,  Bryan Stevenson, lawyer, social activist, and founder of the Equal Justice Initiative, documents his time as a young lawyer in Montgomery, Alabama working to save death row prisoners and those wrongfully accused and incarcerated.

“In countries with a properly functioning legal system, the mob continues to exist, but it is rarely called upon to mete out capital punishment. The right to take human life belongs to the state. Not so in societies where weak courts and poor law enforcement are combined with intractable structural injustices. “In our present day society we as Americans have the cognitive dissonance that what the courts say are final, but also hold to the fact that the majority’s opinion rules.

Throughout time, there has been a decline in the national use of the capital punishment. In “The Decline of the Death Penalty and the Discovery of Innocence”, Frank Baumgartner explains that the innocence movement is the most influential reason as to why there was a national decline in the capital punishment, and he believes that innocence is the driving force behind the decline. My argument is that, with the exception of some states, the continuation of the national decrease in capital punishment will ultimately result in abolishment. This paper will analyze the durability of the capital punishment and how different organizations or Supreme Court investigations will affect future policy changes.

The aim of this research paper is to argue against the use of the death penalty in America. The paper will cover several issues that concern the death penalty and these issues include the constitutionality of capital punishment, wrongly accused on death row, and feasibility. Landmark court cases and precedents will be discussed to illustrate how capital punishment has changed throughout the years and what the limits of the punishment are. Cases such as Furman v. Georgia had established that the arbitrary and inconsistent enforcement of the death penalty had violated the eight and fourteenth amendments, therefore the court had issued a moratorium on the death penalty which lasted for several years. Justices of the Furman case also held that

Death Penalty January 26, 2017 a forty three year old man was executed for the death of two white people. After sitting on death row in prison for thirteen years he was finally put to his death. People are murdered everyday and for those families of the victims they are affected more than anyone and deserve justice for their loved one. Well that’s where the death penalty comes in, executing a criminal that has murdered in a terrible fashion. When one human kills another human they should go through the pain that their victim did; but sadly that is not the case.

Infact, criminals would often receive completely different punishments depending on their social standing, race and gender. Similarly, in the 1970s, the Supreme Court was concerned that the application of the death penalty had become discriminatory in its application” and as a result overturned hundreds of death sentences(Blomberg). Yet today, the death Penalty is just as unjust. Approximately 2% of perpetrators who commit crimes that are punishable by death penalty actually receive the death penalty. While the cases themselves may seem arbitrary those accused who are put on death row follow some shocking trends.

Capital Punishment is the death penalty for those who commit murder. The thought behind this punishment is a life for a life. There has been debate on if the death penalty is right or wrong. Some poeple want the death penalty to be illegal while others argue it is needed to deter crime. There are many valid arguments regarding the death penalty.

In the U.S., the rates of innocent people who are wrongly imprisoned and put on death row are increasing. According to The National Coalition in US from 1976 to 2015, “1,414 people has been executed, of that 156 of them have been exonerated from death row that found innocent and released since 1973” (Innocence). Unfortunately, the statistics above show that our justice system is not always perfect. We lose our innocent people every time when the law makers do not investigate the death penalty cases accurately. The death penalty should be removed state by state because it puts the lives of innocent people at risk.

All over the U.S. and around the world, it is biased and is used disproportionately against different minorities within our communities. Since people make mistakes, there will always be that risk that a person would be executed by mistake. Furthermore, the cost associated with putting a person on death row is making each state think twice about using this flawed and unjust system. More than twenty years ago this country got on board with experimenting with new death penalty statutes aimed toward correcting the injustices and uncertainty of the past concerning the death penalty. There now is an abundance of evidence, in the form of statistics, expert opinion, and personal accounts, which clearly signifies that the death penalty remains contaminated with injustices such as race, economics, local politics, and many other factors that have nothing to do with the specified purposes of capital punishment.

Since 1973, 173 deathrow inmates have been exonerated showing the imperfect nature of the criminal justice system, which is bound to make errors in conviction. Death is permanent; an inmate cannot be released post-mortem. If the death penalty continues, it will certainly lead to the deaths of innocent people and therefore, can not be considered morally upright. When a punishment given out by the justice system violates the Bill of Rights, a cornerstone of American life, and is inarguably immoral, it has no place in our

Since 1973, 144 people on death row have been exonerated. As a percentage of all death sentences, that's just 1.6 percent. But if the innocence rate is 4.1 percent, more than twice the rate of exoneration, the study suggests what most people assumed but dreaded: An untold number of innocent people have been executed. Further, the majority of those wrongfully sentenced to death are likely to languish in prison and never be

I rise today to speak with grave concern about the aspects of the United States death penalty. There are five different forms of execution in the United States: hanging, electrocution, lethal injection, lethal gas, and firing squad. I believe that all of these should be legal in order to sustain justice. “If we show mercy to the guilty, we are only showing cruelty to the innocent.” Why should we abolish the death penalty if someone harms or kills another person?

In the United States, thirty-one states still have the death penalty as a sentence, and nineteen states have abolished it or overturned it as a sentence (States, 2017). As of this year, twenty-one inmates have been executed (Execution, 2017). The death penalty, which is also referred to as capital punishment, is given to individuals who have been convicted of capital crimes such as murder or treason (Staff, 2007). Despite being able to sentence those individuals convicted of murder and other capital crimes in states that sanction it, there is a debate among individuals about the death penalty with regard to whether if it deters crime, whether there is a chance innocent individuals have (or will be executed if wrongly convicted), whether factors

Anna Phillips 5/10/17 Research Paper Death Penalty and Lynchings The alarming increase in state executions is a cause for concern, especially in a society that values equality of all before the law. Executions are an inhumane and potentially unjust method of punishing criminals, much like lynchings were in the past. It does little to dissuade people from committing crimes and does nothing to bring restitution to those who have been the victims of crimes. Worst of all, executions carry with them a finality that should only be undertaken with the up most of certainty of a person’s guilt.

“Our criminal justice system is fallible. We know it, even though we don't like to admit it. It is fallible despite the best efforts of most within it to do justice. And this fallibility is, at the end of the day, the most compelling, persuasive, and winning argument against a death penalty” (Spitzer, 2012). These are the words of Eliot Spitzer who was a political commentator and Democratic Party politician who served as the 54th Governor of New York from January 2007 until his resignation on March 17, 2008.