Death Penalty

I offer my thanks to my opponent for his quick reply. However, I do hope he actually reads my sources. I am not simply making statements devoid of supportive data. "Life imprisonment is less costly?" Yes. [1] Life imprisonment is less costly for a variety of reasons, far beyond lethal injection costs. It is more costly because of a lengthy appeals process. It is more costly because you can not free a dead man, which means that all appeals must be exhausted before sentencing is carried out. It is more costly because a person who is to be executed needs to be guarded more closely. It is more costly because someone dies, and that costs a life. "Imagine how much more money this country would save if we put our murderers to death the moment they are convicted of the crime." This is a separate argument for the death penalty. It is one of modification rather than continuation. I will answer it regardless, but I fail to see how it supports your resolution that the death penalty remain in the United States. Would we save money if we immediately killed those convicted of murder the first time, assuming no appeal? Yes. We would also have a 12% chance of killing an innocent. [2] That would just be murder sanctioned by the state. Furthermore, it is unconstitutional. You can not deprive a person of life or liberty without applying due process of the law. [3] That includes the appeals process. You are claiming that the death penalty should be modified so that it can be a justified expense in the United States. However, the way you have gone about justifying it is completely un-American. ""The death penalty does not deter." Says you? I am pretty sure that is a matter of opinion." It is a matter of fact. In every state that has abolished the death penalty, murder rates have decreased. This is not proof that the death penalty causes murder. It is however proof that there is no correlation between the death penalty and the prevention of murder. Deterrence **is only evident** if there is a correlation between implementation and prevention. Clearly, there is not. [4] "The death penalty would in fact prevent more people from being murdered." It does not. If you live where the death penalty is applied, you are more likely to be killed than if you did not. See above. "In the end you are saving more lives then you are killing." A murderer does not get to justify his murders by saying they were mostly bad guys. Neither should the state. "The overall murder rate jump doesn't prove that the death penalty doesn't work the way its supposed too, that is do to a multiple of different factors including the moral decline of the U.S." Please explain the source of the purported moral decline of the United States. If you think it is a lack of faith, I'm sorry to say it isn't. [5] [6] "The state of North Carolina banned the death penalty in 2001. North Carolina had seen a pretty subtle decline in the murder rate for many years leading up to 2001 after it was decided to ban execution in the state … North Carolina has seen a subtle increase in murder rates in more recent years." You are wrong. North Carolina is a death penalty state on the graph you cited. It still has the death penalty. [7] [1] http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org... (California estimates that a life imprisonment system would cost only $11.5 million per year, where as the death penalty system costs $63.3 million per year) [2] http://www.truthandjusticedenied.com... [3] http://en.wikipedia.org... [4] http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org... (Showing that murder rates have risen in death penalty states by 42% in comparison to states without the death penalty) [5] http://scienceblogs.com... (The religion, it does NOTHING!) [6] http://www.timesonline.co.uk... (Or if it does something … nothing good.) [7] http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org...