The US should abolish capital punishment

Per Saint Augustine, "An unjust law is no law at all." It is my agreement with this quote that causes me to affirm today's resolution. [ Observations ] O1) Rules 2 and 6 clearly clarify the burden of persuasion on both sides. My burden is simply to show that abolishing capital punishment would be beneficial to the interests of American society, while Con's is to show that the existence of the death penalty is beneficial to the people of the United States. Arguments that distract from this burden are irrelevant. O2) Presume Pro, because there exists a universal right to life. It is against the interest of people on death row – who are also a part of American society – to take their lives. Killing people, even criminals, for no reason whatsoever goes against both utilitarianism (since it causes years of suffering on death row) and judging based on the values of society (since it negates a right to life). [ My Case ] I believe that capital punishment should be abolished because (1) it causes psychological harms, (2) it is extremely inhumane, and (3) innocents are executed and face that inhumanity.Contention 1: Capital punishment causes psychological harmsSubpoint A: Judicial executionersExecutions require actual people to oversee them, and to flip the switch that results in the death of the convict. But the experience of killing another human being is incredibly traumatic. Empirical evidence proves that executioners face psychological trauma, including permanent clinical depression and paranoia, from carrying out the task of the death penalty [1]. The team of executioners present during each execution watch the convict say their final words, and possibly struggle for their last breaths – a gut-wrenching experience. The lives of executioners are often completely damaged as a result. Jerry Givens, a former executioner who killed 62 people, explains, "I performed the execution. So you might suffer a little. I'm going to suffer a lot, because I performed the job." [2] To Givens, it was his livelihood – so the government merely exploits people into psychological harms. Subpoint B: FamilyThe family of the executed suffer psychological trauma from realizing that their loved ones have been executed, judged unworthy to live by a government they can no longer trust. Children whose parents have been executed face significant harms to their mental health and are socially stigmatized [3]. A report by Robert Cushing and Susannah Sheffer found that the majority of family of executed inmates faced post-traumatic stress disorder or other severe psychological disorders [4]. Robert Meeropol's parents were executed – on realizing their death, at the mere age of 6, he faced severe anxiety and required the support of a local community to become better. The government didn't do anything about it. Contention 2: The death penalty is inhumaneFirst, being on death row – in what is called "death row syndrome" – causes psychological distress to inmates. Being on death row can fuel depression, delusions and suicidal tendencies [5]. Second, methods of execution are often grossly inhumane and torturous. There are usually two methods of execution followed in the United States: lethal injection and electrocution. Lethal injection uses an anesthetic (usually sodium thiopental), a drug that induces cardiac arrest, and a drug that causes the heart to stop [6]. But the anesthetic wears off after around 6 minutes [7]. This means -- during the execution -- the victim is awake but paralyzed by the cardiac arrest-inducing drug, so they experience intense pain without being able to express it [7]. The second method of execution, electrocution, is even worse. Justice William Brennan explains:"[T]he prisoner's eyeballs sometimes pop out and rest on [his] cheeks. The prisoner often defecates, urinates, and vomits blood and drool. The body turns bright red as its temperature rises, and the prisoner's flesh swells and his skin stretches to the point of breaking. Sometimes the prisoner catches fire . . . [w]itnesses hear a loud and sustained sound like bacon frying, and the sickly sweet smell of burning flesh permeates the chamber." [8]Third, in multiple cases, there are botched executions, because administration of sodium thiopental and similar anesthetic drugs is often not even by a person with a medical degree. There have been 43 botched executions since 1982 [9]. The execution of Allen Lee Davis, for instance, was a botched one of excruciating pain. Indeed, "[b]efore he was pronounced dead … the blood from his mouth had poured onto the collar of his white shirt, and the blood on his chest had spread to about the size of a dinner plate, even oozing through the buckle holes on the leather chest strap holding him to the chair." [10] And even Davis's case sounds kind when compared to Joseph Wood's two hours of gasping and choking [11], since botched lethal injections are worse than electrocution and hanging [12]. Contention 3: Innocents are executedAccording to the National Academy of Sciences, 4.1% of death penalty convicts are innocent of their crimes [13]. And 0.5% of all people executed have been innocent [14]. That's crazy. America, land of the free and home of the brave, is also the place where – to fulfill some arbitrary sense of justice – innocent people are killed by its government in excruciatingly painful processes. It makes life imprisonment for sock theft sound the nicest part of the criminal justice system. Not convinced by mere statistics? Then you should be convinced by the torturous electrocution of Jesse Tasero [15] – an innocent man executed for a crime he didn't commit. He was just at the wrong place in the wrong time – and any of us could be too. Because for living in a country where a person is "innocent until proven guilty," a surprising number of innocents are killed. And before you jump in and say life-without-parole is worse, cross-apply C2: death row syndrome and eyeballs that literally pop out aren't pleasant. And the fact that our deeply flawed, broken criminal justice system is given the power to kill innocent civilians isn't comforting at all. It's scary. And it isn't just people who didn't commit crimes who are wrongfully executed. Mentally ill people – who committed crimes, but weren't truly guilty since they don't fulfill a mens rea requirement – are also executed often. Our retributive model doesn't work because mental illnesses are treatable. Prisoners can be treated like people. And crime rates will reduce [16]. John Ferguson didn't deserve his execution, when his crime wasn't his direct fault, but this flawed criminal justice system gave it to him anyway [17]. Because who cares if a person is innocent: it still grants "closure," right? In Con's world, innocents face torturous electrocutions and lethal injections, and the government exploits people to face psychological damage in exchange for meager payment – capitalism prevails! Unless Con proves this world is the best one to live in, vote Pro, because an unjust law is no law at all. [1] http://www.njadp.org...[2] http://abcnews.go.com...[3] http://www.quno.org...[4] http://b.3cdn.net...[5] http://www.internetjournalofcriminology.com...[6] http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org...[7] http://www.scientificjournals.org...[8] Craig Brandon, "The Electric Chair," p. 205[9] http://www.clearinghouse.net...[10] http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org...[11] http://www.nbcnews.com...[12] http://www.bbc.com...[13] http://www.theguardian.com...[14] http://www.forbes.com...[15] http://www.theguardian.com...[16] http://www.theguardian.com...[17] http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org...