Critically evaluate arguments for and against the death penalty.

Many arguments for and against the death penalty have been the source of the deliberation on whether the death penalty should be abolished or not. Abolitionists, firstly, argue that this is an irreversible form of punishment so any mistake would be fatal.  This has proven to be the strongest argument against the death penalty because the death of an innocent individual causes much concern about the system. An article printed in 2001 by a College professor from Rhodes College stated that the courts found serious, reversible error in 68% of capital sentences between 1973 and 1995 and in cases where the outcomes were known, 75% of death row prisoners sent back for retrial were found to deserve a lesser sentence, and 7% of those sent for retrial were acquitted altogether. He found that it was important for this system to be successful and morally just, and therefore it should be ensured that the right person was sentenced to death and within the guidelines of the constitution. He agreed that there was much support for the death penalty but he is assured that if people knew the statistics of mistakes made, there would be much less support. A problem linked to this is the representation given to defendants during their trial. The American constitution requires the lawyer to be competent, and not under the influence of drugs or alcohol, but it “does not say the lawyer has to be awake”. This shows that the representation offered to defendants can often lead to them being sentenced unjustly. Not only can the representation be a problem but much of the evidence requires witness statements, of the victim or of bystanders. Many times have defendants been sentenced to death after a “positive” identification made by the witness, but how sure can we be that this identification is 100% correct? Not often. The reason for this increasing risk of the innocent being executed is due to the death penalty being the sentence for more crimes and more states beginning to use the death penalty. With greater use of the death penalty, there is more chance of mistakes being made. Along side this, the expansion of the death penalty, the appeal process is much shorter and narrower, so more mistakes are likely to be made. There are also many factors which will place pressure on a prosecutor to have the defendant sentenced, even on the basis of weak evidence and poor witness testimonies, such as heightened publicity and biased juries (generally, those who oppose to the death penalty are eliminated from the jury). However, in an article by Robert Pambianco (Chief Policy Counsel for the Washington Legal Foundation), he claimed that “there is no proof of an innocent person being executed since 1900”. Therefore, controversy will remain over whether any innocents have been executed, but the problem remains that we can never be sure.

A solution for assuring this guilt or proving an individual’s innocence has been found in scientific measures such as DNA testing. Although not allowed in most states, it is believed that there would be a greater decrease in the prosecution of innocent victims. As well as this, pro-death penalty views stated that there is no legal system, which is flawless and that the risk of some innocents being executed is one that must be taken to keep order in society.

This leads on to the argument of whether the death penalty is in fact a deterrent or whether it makes no difference in levels of crime. A recent survey in the New York Times showed that there were lower homicide rates in states without the death penalty that in those which did have it. Statistics showed that states with the death penalty have had between 40% and 101% higher crime rates in the last 20 years. There has also been a difference in crime rates in the South and the North of the USA. Crime rates in the South tended to be higher than in the North. This may be to do with the culture in the South and their high gun ownership. All these statistics and surveys show that capital punishment does not deter crime. As well as this, it is important to look at crimes and how they are committed. People committing murder and other personal crimes may or may not premeditate them. If the crime is premeditated, the criminal often concentrates on avoiding detection, arrest and conviction so therefore, the threat of even the severest punishment will not deter those who do not expect to be caught. If the crime is not premeditated, then it is not possible to see how the threat of any punishment could deter it. Furthermore, there are clinically documented cases in which the death penalty actually incited the capital crimes it was supposed to deter. These include instances of the so-called suicide-by-execution syndrome – persons who wanted to die but feared taking their own lives, and committed murder so that the state would kill them. These are many examples given by abolitionists against the death penalty as a deterrent. On the other hand, Isaac Ehrlich believed that “one cannot reject the hypothesis that punishment in general, and execution in particular, exert a unique deterrent effect on potential murders”. George Pataki, the governor of New York State in 1997 released an article in which he claimed that, “capital punishment gives killers good cause to fear arrest and conviction”. For around 20 years in New York, there was no death penalty and Pataki believed that the fear of crime was compounded by the fact that it went mainly unpunished. Therefore to decrease this fear, the death penalty is needed for to fight and punish crime. After he had re-instated the death penalty in New York, in his article, he states that murders went down one third.

Discrimination issues have also caused much controversy among the individuals convicted and sentenced to the death penalty. Amnesty International stated that it was found in Philadelphia that “African-American defendants were almost four times more likely to receive the death penalty” that those of other ethnic backgrounds. Statistics confirm this discrimination. Between 1930 and 1990, 4016 individuals were executed in the USA, 53% of these were black. For committing the act of murder, 3343 individuals were executed, 51% of these being black. It is important to note, alongside these statistics, that only 14 percent of the nation’s population is black. The next point regarding alleged racial discrimination by abolitionists, is that although the percentage of white victims to black victims is split equally, 50% - 50%, in 82% of studies, the likelihood of being charged and sentenced to the death penalty was influenced by the race of the victim. It was found that “those who murdered whites were more likely to be sentenced to death than those who murdered black victims”. These statistics show that there seems to be quite severe discrimination in the American Justice System and their decisions in whom to sentence to death and who to give a lower sentence to. This may be due to several reasons such as bias in the courts or all white juries. On the other hand, there seem to be a different set of statistics, which show an opposite conclusion to the question of discrimination in the death penalty sentencing. Dudley Sharp, in his article Pro and Con: The Death Penalty in Black and White, claimed, “black murderers represent 35% of those executed and white murderers 56%”. He stated that if these statistics are looked at bluntly, there must be systematic racism but if looked into with more depth, “blacks represent 47% of murders and whites 37%”. Therefore, he showed that white defendants are more likely to be executed that black defendants. The conclusion of these two opposing statistical evaluations shows that statistics are risky evidence of any bias in the courts; therefore this is a difficult argument for or against the death penalty because there seems to be no clear-cut evidence of either.

Human Rights activists have also argued the case the death penalty is not only against human rights (right to life) and the fact that no human has the right to take another life, but also against the Eighth Amendment. For many years, Americans debated the morality and necessity of the death penalty. The Eighth Amendment clearly states that any “cruel and unusual punishments” are forbidden. The debate then lay on whether the death penalty is in fact a “cruel and unusual punishment”. Pro-Death Penalty views claimed that the death penalty is not a cruel and unusual punishment in the eyes of those who wrote the Amendments due to the Fifth Amendment. This states, that “no person shall be held to answer for a capital… crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a Grand Jury.” As well as this, the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments state that no person’s life should be taken “without the due process of law.” The Pro-death penalty view therefore agrees, that according to the 8th Amendment, the punishment must fit the crime, which they believe it does. Through time, most of the types of execution would have been seen as unusual and cruel but it has been argued that the lethal injection is no such punishment and that it follows all the rules of the Amendments.  

There are many other arguments used for and against the death penalty, including whether the cost of executing someone costs more than imprisoning them for life, whether the biblical term “an eye for an eye” should be referred to in the case of the death penalty or whether it teaches the wrong ideas about killing if justified. The lack of any strong statistical evidence for either views restricts the validity for most of the arguments, making it harder for either side to make their point plausible. It seems that the death penalty will continue to exist in many countries, including the United States, since it popularity is still relatively high, but more individuals seem to be leaning towards using an alternative punishment. An alternative could be if they were sentenced to life without parole and were required to make some sort of financial restitution. The controversy will remain for many years since the split views are strongly emphasised.

On a personal note, I have always been opposed to the death penalty, based mainly on the view that no one should have the right to take another life. It is setting the wrong example, as someone could decide one day to kill another person with the view that it is a justified killing, which is what the death penalty suggests. As well as this, unless it can be proved that the death penalty somehow deters crime and is unbiased, fair and just, there is no need for it.

Bibliography

Berns W., For Capital Punishment; Crime and the Morality of the Death Penalty, Basic Books Inc. Publishers, New York, 1974

Bowers W.J, Executions in America, Lexington Books, USA, 1974

McLaughlin E. and Muncie J., The Sage Dictionary of Criminology, SAGE Publications Inc, London, 2003

 

 

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