Resolved: The United States of America should abolish the death penalty

I will be using this round to rebut my opponent’s contentions. He starts off by asserting that to win the debate, he only needs to show one case where the death penalty is justified, and then the law can be properly constrained to “just be used for that one situation.” This is incorrect. To prove that the death penalty should be kept, it is up to Con to show that it is both effective and practical. If Con cannot refute my arguments against the status quo, but instead proposes an alternate system in which the death penalty is used, then he must show that his new system is effective, practical, and cost-efficient. Broken Window Theory While this theory makes sense, Con makes a big assumption. This assumption is that, if we don’t kill criminals, then we are signalling to others that criminality is acceptable. This is a huge leap in logic. A life imprisonment accomplishes the same thing; it shows that committing serious crimes will not go unpunished. Con has not shown that the death penalty does better than life imprisonment at deterring criminals, and thus has not shown that life imprisonment is not an equal substitute to the death penalty’s role in the “broken window theory.” Con’s evidence for the validity of the broken window theory is not evidence that is particularly in favour of the death penalty. It only shows that we need to have punishment for crimes, it does not show that the death penalty, and not alternatives like life imprisonment, is the right punishment. I have shown in my opening argument that there is no correlation between crime rates and the use of capital punishment, and thus this proves that the death penalty is not a necessary punishment under the broken windows theory. For Con’s broken window argument to be effective, he will need to prove correlation and causation between the use of the death penalty and lower crime rates. If not, we can substitute the punishment of life imprisonment and abolish the wasteful death penalty. Prison Crime Con states that be killing criminals, we can prevent crime inside prisons. He presents no evidence for this, and there are serious holes in this reasoning. Like I pointed out in the opening round, executions cost a lot of money and take up a lot of court time [which is not in high supply]. Con is suggesting that we kill those who commit crimes inside prison, on the taxpayer’s dime, without providing evidence that this will actually reduce crime inside prisons. There are already methods, such as solitary confinement, that don’t cost the taxpayers as much as executions, aren’t dishing out the irreversible punishment of death, and have actually been proven to work. Con will need to prove that killing inmates is more effective than solitary confinement at reducing prison crime levels to justify spending more taxpayer money on the executions. Con’s Counter-Plan Roy Latham’s plan is extremely vague and does not prove the effectiveness of this shortened appeals process, nor that it saves costs. On top of that, he only notes one cause of lengthy appeals, and assumes that this is the only thing that makes killing criminals more expensive than locking them away for life. The burden of proof is on Con to provide a more detailed plan to reduce costs, instead of just saying “we’ll reduce appeals somehow, and this will save us an undetermined amount of money.” Another serious problem with reducing appeals is that it increases the likelihood of innocent people being executed. Remember, the reason that the appeals process is so long is because it is the ultimate injustice for the state to kill an innocent man. I have shown in my first contention in my opening round that it is already proven that the justice system makes mistakes when handing down sentences for capital punishment, people have been exonerated all the time, and often many years after their sentencing. The call for reduced appeals in not new, some states have been asking for it for some time now, an example being Texas. Recently, a mortal blow was administered to those asking for reduced appeals. A man who was exonerated after 12 years on death row came out against the proposal to reduce appeals, revealing that had the appeals process been shorter, he would have been executed [1]. This is just one example. The fact of the matter is, that right now, despite the lengthy appeals process, innocent people are being sentenced to death and it is very likely that they are being killed [as shown in my opening round.] If we reduce this process even further, we are almost guaranteeing that more innocent people will be killed. Preventing Deaths Con gives one example of Ted Bundy, who escaped from prison and killed more people. He states that if we institute a fast track for murderers, we reduce their likelihood of escaping, and can thus save “about 4 or 5 lives a year.” There is a big problem with this argument. Con keeps bringing up a “fast track to execution,” but this proposal is so vague that we cannot take it seriously. I have shown that his only proposal so far, to reduce the appeals process, will actually cost more innocent lives. Already, the execution process often fails to protect innocent people, a faster one would only cause the careless executions of more innocent lives The crux of the argument is how many innocent lives are we willing to take. Is it acceptable for the state to execute innocents under the pretense of reducing crime? Gladiator Combat This is not a proposal even worth considering. Con makes a number of assumptions and contradictions. Firstly, he states that Americans will be just fine with redirecting the billions spent on popular sports into gladiator combat. He has not proven that gladiator combat will be more popular than the most popular sports in America and the world. The assumption that modern people, many of whom cannot even stomach gory movies, will be perfectly fine with funneling billions of dollars into gladiator areas, is very naïve one. Secondly, he contradicts himself. He states that these vents could give murderers a chance to redeem their lives and become heroes, but he also states that the family members of those killed would be please by watching those who killed their loved ones get slain. What if the murderer actually becomes a hero of the arena? What of the family members of those who he killed? They would get no justice, and they would have to watch the killer of their loved ones become a vilified hero of the American public. There is not justice in that. The utilitarian argument by Con assumes that utilitarianism is the most ethical framework. However Con just assumes that gladiator combat will provide happiness for Americans. He states that their “sport watching habits and the events that followed 9/11” prove this. However, this is big assumption. Americans don’t watch sports where people are brutally murdered. Also, he fails to note how the military actions after 9/11 were only popular until it was revealed how many innocent civilians were being killed. Conclusion Con has failed to provide any good reasons to keep the death penalty as it is. He has also failed to provide any real and effective alternate solutions to keep the death penalty. Therefore, his case has failed. Vote Pro. Sources 1. https://www.texastribune.org...