The Death Penalty Should Be Abolished

I. Wrongful Convictions My opponent cites (or rather does not cite) that over 130 people have been released from death row since 1973. This doesn't mean the death penalty is inaccurate. On the contrary, it is an extra show of precaution. Cases where the death penalty is administered are 99.86% of the time accurate. [1] As for LWOP cases, ". .. from 1973 to 2012, about 5,000 inmates per year die while in custody, or about 200,000 total, during that time. We cannot bring back any of those that may have been innocent, either. ”[2] Because the death penalty can never be reversed, crimes investigated where the death penalty may be used are usually more thoroughly investigated than LWOP or other sentences, meaning that the death penalty decreases the percentage of wrongful convictions. Looking at it another way, innocent people are, on balance, helped by the death penalty. "Murderers that we have allowed to murder again, recidivist murderers, MIGHT number around 28,000 since 1973, based upon existing studies. " In other words, far more people are saved by the use of the death penalty than will ever be wrongly executed. The study goes on, "28 studies, beginning in 2000, find for a deterrent effect, ranging from 1-28 innocent lives spared per execution, or totals from 1,254 - 35,112 innocent lives saved. "[2] What we see is that more innocent people are saved by the death penalty than condemned by it. II. Cost As I mentioned in the last round, "There is no question that the up front costs of the death penalty are significantly higher than for equivalent LWOP cases. There also appears to be no question that, over time, equivalent LWOP cases are much more expensive - from $1.2 to $3.6 million - than death penalty cases. Opponents ludicrously claim that the death penalty costs, over time, 3-10 times more than LWOP. "[3] My opponent isn't really looking at the facts. III. Rehabilitation Failure I'm not going to get too much into the justice/retribution arguments, but since I already proved that the death penalty, saves lives, deters criminals, and saves money, it is only just for justice. As this mentions, "Abolitionists claim that the death penalty is a means of revenge. It is not. One way for the victim's family to get revenge would be to go out and murder a member of the murderer's family in order to get him to experience the same type of suffering he put them through. If the purpose of the state in executing murderers was retribution or revenge, then criminals would be executed in the same way they that murdered their victims. The point of the death penalty, however, is not to see how much pain can be unleashed on the murderer but to bring him to justice. "[4]Finally on morality, I will just post this to save some time: Morality is defined as "the principles of right and wrong. " As moral creatures, humans deserve praise for good deeds, and punishment for bad ones. Punishment may range from a slap on the wrist to death, but the punishment must fit the crime. This is known as lex talionis, or in common jargon, "an eye for an eye. " Abolitionists often insist that if we argue for lex talion justice we must be prepared to rape rapists, beat sadists, and burn down the houses of arsonists. Certainly, this is the case if we take the lex talion literally, and the criminals do deserve those punishments, but we needn't take it literally. The ancient Jews did not. They allowed for monetary compensation for physical or property damage. Why then, if it is not morally okay to rape rapists, is it acceptable to execute murderers? The answer is simple. There is no redeeming value to carrying out the former punishment. Raping the rapist will only cause someone else to degrade themselves by doing it. It will not prevent the rapist from raping again. Executing murderers, however, prevents them from committing their crime again, and thus protects innocent victims. The good, therefore, outweighs the bad, and the executioner is morally justified in taking the murderer's life. On the other hand, if the abolitionist argues that killing is always wrong, then he must also concede that killing in self-defense is unacceptable and should be punished. Few, if any, however, are willing to do so. The abolitionist may choose to argue that the state should never kill. But consider also the scenario of protecting someone else's life. Are police officers (the state) justified in killing attempted murderers to save a victim's life? If the answer to this question is yes, then the question is no longer if the state is justified in taking the life of criminals but when. Morally, it is wrong to simply incarcerate someone for murder. A sentence of life in an air-conditioned, cable-equipped prison where a person gets free meals three times a day, personal recreation time, and regular visits with friends and family is a slap in the face of morality. People will say here that not all prisons are like the one cited. This betrays an ignorance, however, of current trends. Eventually, criminal rights activists will see to it that all prisons are nice places to go. But regardless of the conditions of a particular prison, someone who murders another human being can only be made to pay for his actions by forfeiting his own life. This is so, simply because a loss of freedom does not and cannot compare to a loss of life. If the punishment for theft is imprisonment, then the punishment for murder must be exponentially more severe, because human life is infinitely more valuable than any material item. Take, for example, a murderer who took the life of a teenager. The parents of the victim will be among the taxpayers that pay for his meals and his cable television. Should he choose to take advantage of college courses the prison may offer, the parents of the victim will be indirectly financing those expenses as well. Nothing could be further from justice. It is of this type of situation that the abolitionist approves. Somewhere along the line, their priorities have been turned upside down. [4][5][6]The death penalty is justified both in the practical sense and the moral sense. Sources [1]: . http://www.debate.org...[2]: . http://homicidesurvivors.com...[3]: . http://www.prodeathpenalty.com...[4]: . http://www.hoshuha.com...[5]: . http://biblicalresearch.gc.adventist.org...[6]: . http://www.theatlantic.com...