Capital Punishment should not be Used as a Punishment in the United States

I apologize for not posting in the last round. I just started a new college semester and things have been hectic. "Contention 1: Safety a) According to Van Wormer, "Violence breeds violence, a fact borne out of crime statistics. The average homicide rate in the twelve states prohibiting the death penalty, for example, is considerably lower than the average homicide rate in the thirty-eight states where execution is legal. The effect is interactive. A high crime rate leads to a cry for execution and execution itself may promote further violence." b) What this piece of evidence says is that capital punishment leads to more violence. Is this safe for society? I think not. The fact that it causes more deaths shows that it is not safe for society to use, and therefore should not be used for this justification." That is a false correlation. While it is statistically true that SOME states where the death penalty is prohibited have a lower homicide rate, this does not prove that rate of homicide is the direct cause of this. In fact, the cause of these lower homicide rates are socioeconomical: you will also notice that these states have a higher average per capita income. Using your reasoning, you could say that the outlawing of the death penalty somehow causes a higher average income. This would be an equally false correlation. Furthermore, a paper in the Stanford Law Review entitled "Uses And Abuses of Empirical Evidence In The Death Penalty Debate" (which can be downloaded at http://www.stat.columbia.edu...) demonstrated that the the rise and fall of homicide rates over the years followed a similar pattern in both death penalty states and non-death penalty states. Also, it demonstates that while the homicide rate for the entire country rose dramatically between the early 60's and the early 90's, the rate of execution had dropped proportionally. "Contention 2: Deterrence a) To deter, according to dictionary.com, is to discourage or restrain from acting or proceeding. So, when attempting to deter a crime, it should restrain citizens from commiting this crime. But, according to suicide murder theory, this is not true. b) According to Van Wormer, "Sometimes a person will kill, whether conciously or unconsiously, so that he or she may be killed in a final act of retribution by the state. A former director of a state department of corrections referred to this phenomenon when he wrote, 'I know of a number of murder victims who would still be alive if the death penalty had not been in effect.'" While it is certainly possible that a suicidal person without the courage to kill themselves might kill others in order to get the state to execute them, I find it highly unlikely. Most people are not so violent and lacking in regard for human life that they would be psychologically capable of doing such a thing on purpose. If done on an unconscious level, it would be damn near impossible to prove. "--This proves without a doubt that suicide-murder is real, and that it might not even be a concious effort to reach the final punishment of death. This means that not only is there no deterrence, but it also strengthens contention one." It proves nothing. Just because a former director of the State Department said it, it doesn't make it true. c) Case Studies-- (On the website, it goes into much further detail of the chilling actions of these murderers) i) Sherril Harston- "Here was a man so bent on death, apparently, that he had killed a young mother and her child, thereby conciously or unconciously moving himself toward a fate he believed was his. When Harston was given a life-sentence instead, he fired his attorney and filed for an appeal for a new trial. Once in prison, he threatened to kill again." --Harston even wrote a song about his unconcious effort to be killed by electricution. (On website) ii) Gary Gilmore- "...a prime example of one who plotted his own dramatic end. After being paroled from Marion Federal Penitentiary, Gilmore seemed strangely driven to go to Utah where execution by firing squad, rather than his home in Oregon, then a non-death penalty jurisdiction. He fought his attorney for the right to be killed, and through extensive public attention managed to be immortalized in death as he could not in life." --Gilmore moved to another state in order to die. He was willing to do anything in order to have the state kill him. iii)There are 22 examples of this on the website provided. I do not have the time nor patience to write them, but the two examples I have provided ought to be enough to prove my point. The death penalty is not a good form of deterrence. In fact, it causes the action it is supposed to protect from. Point made." As I said, situations such as these are entirely possible. However, they are obviously the exception rather than the rule. It is true: there are many murderers who will not be deterred. For example, a criminal who kills accidentally while in the commission of another felony will not be deterred because he or she never intended to kill in the first place. Also, anyone who commits a murder out of rage could not possibly be deterred because he or she would already be past all reason. However, there are some who would likely be deterred. For example: a person looking to kill their spouse for the insurance money. Anyone planning a murder out ahead of time would inevitably have to consider the possible punishment. "Contention 3: Justice a) Justice, defined by Aristotle, is giving each his due. I have some questions for my opponent. Are the victims of these crimes caused by the death penalty getting their due? Do these criminals get their due by getting the punishment they want? Is it really a punishment when the criminal wants it? No. There is not justice in the death penalty. Therefore, there is no reason for capital punishment in the United States." You are falsely assuming that all murderers want to die. You have no proof of this, and there is clear evidence to the contrary. Most murderers fight for life in prison rather than death, exhausting all of their appeals. Now for my reasons why the death penalty SHOULD be legal: 1. Safety - The death penalty is the one way to guarantee that a murderer will never kill again. Even if in prison for life and never escapes, it is possible that he or she will kill other prisoners. In fact, it is more likely. "Lifers", as they are commonly known, are notoriously dangerous prisoners because they have nothing to dose. 2. Justice - Killing a murderer is giving precisely what is due. It is unjust to give the murderer more mercy than he or she gave to his or her victim. 3. Cutting expenses - Why should law-abiding taxpayers have to pay for the food, shelter, legal counsel, and medical care of murderers? These people have already shown the ultimate disregard for life and the social contract. While I am not a supporter of social welfare, it is worthy to note that convicted murderers in many states are treated better than the poor. They get free food, shelter, legal counsel, and medical care while the poor sleep on the street, starve, and die of disease.