Capital punishment is justifiable

There are many points which my opponent has raised in his counter-arguments, most of which I disagree with; therefore, for the sake of clarity, I will be quoting his statements in bold, and subsequently responding to them piece by piece.Rebutting Counter-Argument #1:"My opponent's graph intended to create a side by side comparison of states with & without the death penalty in present time. When we're studying the effects of a specific punishment on crime you don't look at the total crime while you're first implementing the punishment, you look after the fact to see if the punishment worked."I certainly agree that the extent to which capital punishment can efficiently serve as a deterrent cannot be accurately determined simply by examining a State's crime rates while the practice has only recently been implemented, which is precisely why my graph (Exhibit 1.0) attempts to do no such thing; rather, what my graph reveals is that States which do not employ capital punishment have consistently demonstrated more favorable crimes rates over a near 20-year period. In other words, States which utilize the death penalty have unfailingly demonstrated higher rates of crime than States which have abandoned the practice."A brief examination of [my opponent's] first graph will reveal that the following years showed a drop in overall numbers, which is what my graph was showing. What's important to note is that he said that his second source upheld the idea that his 1st source stated, which is the death penalty only enhances crime, but it actually disagrees entirely. You can see that his graph doesn't accept this notion, his graph shows that crime/punishment went down in the following years. So, my opponent's 1st and 2nd sources are at complete odds."Reading the above assertion, I can only assume that my opponent has misinterpreted the data revealed by my graph. Allow me to show Exhibit 1.0 once again:(Previous Exhibit 1.0) Provided by http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org......Note that the green bars represent the collective crime rates of States which utilize capital punishment, while the light blue bars represent the collective crime rates of States which have abandoned the practice. As can be clearly seen from the data, the States which have abandoned capital punishment consistently demonstrate lower crimes rates than their pro-capital punishment counterparts. Moreover, whenever a decrease in crime is observed for States which employ the death penalty, a decrease is likewise seen in the crime of non-capital punishment States at the same time; therefore, such decreases in crime cannot be rationally attributed to the utilization of capital punishment, seeing as how States which refuse the death penalty acquire the same decline; obviously, then, the drops in criminal offenses are the result of another factor, unrelated to capital punishment."What my opponent's 2nd graph [Exhibit 1.1) neglects to accept is that the time period of the 1950's-the late 1960's is in a time period that was historic for civil unrest. Taken into consideration, it is no surprise that there will be more crime during civil unrest than there would during the honeymoon phase." In all actuality, evidence seems to directly contradict my opponent's assertion, as is evident from the graph below, which clearly demonstrates that homicide rates in the 50's and 60's were much lower than in the 70's, 80's, and 90's:Exhibit 1.0 Provided by the Bureau of Justice Statistics, http://wwwbjs.ojp.usdoj.gov...Therefore, considering this information, it becomes even more impressive that California experienced a significant decrease in homicide rates during the late 60's, 70's, 80's, and early 90's once it stopped utilizing capital punishment as a form of legal discipline (as Exhibit 1.1 in my previous argument demonstrates); hence, it becomes blatantly obvious that the death penalty did not successfully serve as a deterrent. "[My opponent's] 3rd graph [Exhibit 1.2], about handgun crimes, only illustrates that we live in a culture that glamorizes violence. That is no surprise and is accepted as the truth by both my opponent and I..." Although I do agree that our culture possesses the unfortunate tendency to glorify violence, I believe my opponent has failed to establish any evidence to reasonably suggest that the high crime rates of the US compared to other countries which do not utilize capital punishment are solely the result of the glorification of violence. Is my opponent asserting that other countries listed on Exhibit 1.2 (such as Britain, Canada, Australia, etc) do not also glorify violence in particular aspects of their societies? Rebutting Counter-Argument #2:"I set forth the criteria for which punishment is to be met, according to our criminal justice program, and my opponent has completely sidestepped the idea. The purpose of our criminal justice system, as defined by the US department of Justice (Source #2 in my first round), is to allow for retribution, incapacitation, deterrence, rehabilitation, and restoration. When dealing with terrorists who target thousands, serial killers who target children and those who apply torture to their murder victims, only 2 of the 5 criteria can be met: retribution & deterrence. My opponent has completely disregarded the idea in it's entirety to focus on one portion of the idea." Even if my opponent's assertion is true that only 2 of the 5 criminal justice program's criteria (retribution and deterrence) can be met in the case of heinous, psychopathic, or non-rehabilitative offenders, I have still presented a perfectly good and evidentially substantiated case that capital punishment does not serve as an effective deterrent; therefore, life in prison without parole would meet the demands of the deterrence criterion just as effectively, if not more so, than the death penalty. Moreover, retribution need not require death; life in prison without parole is perfectly capable of administering just retribution, therefore fulfilling the retribution criterion. "My opponent's entire side of the debate is to essentially equate capital punishment with murder, and deem it wrong because the actions are the same. This, however, presents a false equivalence—a mad man is not the same as a madman."I have made no such assertion, nor would I concede to it. My case is not that capital punishment is equivalent to murder; rather, my case is that capital punishment is unjustified due to the fact that it is utterly unnecessary and unjustly dangerous.Rebutting Counter-Argument #3:"My opponent states that I have used an argumentum ad populum fallacy, in considering the opinion of others in a democracy. The problem here is that, 'argumentum ad populum,' is Latin for "appeal to the people," and the job of a democracy is to do just that."My argument here is that mass support of capital punishment is not sufficient cause to deem something justified. Many things have been implemented by democracy which are not justified, such as slavery. Does the simple fact that something is approved of by the majority truly make it justified? Not at all."In his latest round, that expert opinions reign supreme on the subject of capital punishment."Although I did use expert opinions to strengthen my case, I did not insinuate that such opinions "reign supreme" on the subject of capital punishment.The remaining portion of my opponent's 3rd counter-argument is primarily a re-affirmation of his previous arguments (all of which I believe I've effectively rebutted in both this post and my previous one); as to his argument that the majority of police officers and chiefs support capital punishment, I will concede to that assertion, although I do not believe it is sufficient alone to make my opponent's case.In closing, I would like to again thank David for this fun, intellectually stimuating debate; a worthy opponent, indeed :)[1] http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org......[2] http://wwwbjs.ojp.usdoj.gov...