Death Penalty

Before I start, I would like to point out that the use of copying and pasting an argument is plagiarism. Now then, onto the rebuttal. "For the most cruel and heinous crimes, the ones for which the death penalty is applied, offenders deserve the worst punishment under our system of law, and that is the death penalty. Any lesser punishment would undermine the value society places on protecting lives." While you assert that the death penalty should be used for the "most cruel and heinous crimes", what determines what is cruel and heinous? Do we limit such an act to that which takes a victims life, or do we broaden in to include things that don't involve any death? Secondly, you assert that any lesser punishment would "undermine the value society places on protecting lives". This statement seems contradictory to the fact that 18 states in the U.S. have abolished the death penalty, with four of those states abolishing the death penalty in the last five years [1]. Furthermore, the number of criminals charged with homicides that are in prison has risen by more than 100% from 2000 - 2010 [2]. "Society has always used punishment to discourage would-be criminals from unlawful action. Since society has the highest interest in preventing murder, it should use the strongest punishment available to deter murder, and that is the death penalty. If murderers are sentenced to death and executed, potential murderers will think twice before killing for fear of losing their own life." How do you know that society has the highest interest in preventing murder? You source states no numbers to back this statement up. When one looks at the numbers to compare how many people are incarcerated for murder and how many are incarcerated for drugs, the number of inmates charged with homicide per year has increased by about 160 from 2000-2010 [2]. The number of people incarcerated for drug use has increased by an average of 43,266 inmates per year [3]. Society seems to value getting rid of drugs well above getting rid of murder. Lastly on this point, who is to say that potential murders will think twice before killing someone? When one analyzes the murder rates per 100,000 residents with those states that have the death penalty and those that do not, one finds no correlation between the murder rates, and the implementation of a death penalty [4]. "For years, criminologists analyzed murder rates to see if they fluctuated with the likelihood of convicted murderers being executed, but the results were inconclusive. Then in 1973 Isaac Ehrlich employed a new kind of analysis which produced results showing that for every inmate who was executed, 7 lives were spared because others were deterred from committing murder. Similar results have been produced by disciples of Ehrlich in follow-up studies." No study cited, and furthermore it begs the question of: "If inconclusive rates were found for years, why did Ehrlich's studies have statistically significant results?". If many years worth of studies show inconclusive data, then why should we change our views based on a few newer studies? "Moreover, even if some studies regarding deterrence are inconclusive, that is only because the death penalty is rarely used and takes years before an execution is actually carried out. Punishments which are swift and sure are the best deterrent. The fact that some states or countries which do not use the death penalty have lower murder rates than jurisdictions which do is not evidence of the failure of deterrence. States with high murder rates would have even higher rates if they did not use the death penalty." You have countered your own argument. If you aim to discredit that such studies are inconclusive because the death penalty isn't used very often, then why would non-inconclusive data not fall under the same problem? If you don't have enough data to make conclusive data (as you assert), than surely you can't say that you have enough data, just because your study has statistically conclusive evidence. 1. http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org... 2. http://www.bjs.gov... (The very last statistic link. Microsoft Excel document) 3. http://www.drugsense.org... 4. https://www.dropbox.com... (Microsoft Excel document. Sources inside)