Death Penalty

I'd like to ask why my opponent sees it as "morally senseless that a serial killer would not face death as a punishment for their multiple crimes"? Surely, if one of these crimes was murder, which many argue is sufficient enough to carry the death penalty, then what is the death penalty itself if it is not murder? Self defence? Obviously we can see that it is not. The death penalty is a form of pre-meditated murder and if you disagree with murder strongly enough to support another form of it, you must see the inaccuracies in your argument. On the subject of economic arguments, a US researcher documented these five points... "1) Death penalty trials run longer and involve more costs to the economy than non-death penalty prosecutions; 2) The lengthy appeals process incurred by death penalty sentences involves an average of seven years legal expenses charged to the public; 3) The costs of housing Death Row inmates is prohibitively more expensive than housing the non-condemned prison population; 4) There is no demonstrable proof that the death penalty reduces violent crime and thereby lessens the economic impact of crime; 5) The only way that the death penalty could be made economically feasible would be to revamp the American system of jurisprudence and the philosophical system of justice upon which it is based." The fact that the "majority" of the people want the death penalty or not is irrelevant - and my opponent's Gallup poll was based on a US audience whilst he based the remainder of his argument on the UK. When it comes down to it we must look at this as an issue of natural rights that every man is born with. So let's say this... (1) All human beings have natural rights, predating any man made constitutions, which are; (a) inviolable (b) universal (2) One of which is the right to life (3) Given 1a and 2, the death penalty is morally wrong, and, concomitantly, unjust. The "majority" should not have the power to vote away another person's natural rights. Now, of course prisoners need to lose some of their rights, because otherwise the preservation of rights in generally would be severally at risk. But we should aim to minimise the amount of naturally prescribed rights that they lose to achieve the most just form of punishment. And the removal of their life is entirely unjustified when punishing them for removing a life. The proper purpose of law is the practical realisation of the natural right to self-defence, implemented by an authority and so becoming the right to a collective defence. It's not about retribution. It's not about an eye for an eye. It's not even about "justice". It's just about the right to collective defence. Prospective killing of criminals is not part of the right to collective defence. Perhaps we would do better with the "Arpaio model"; perhaps we would do better with more rehabilitative justice, as I increasingly believe. I certainly do not think that prisoners should be living in lavish, taxpayer funded prisons. In fact, I believe in privatising the operation and building of prisoners and making them work to pay for it themselves. But that is not the argument here. All in all, I do not believe in giving the government, or any organisation, the right to remove peoples' lives without their consent. If a prisoner facing life in prison wishes to end their life then by all means they should be allowed to commit suicide or be euthanised. But the death penalty is not the answer, no matter how brutal the crime.