Texas has executed about 200 people since 1976. But in recent years, Texas has had a murder rate nearly twice Wisconsin's. Because the death penalty does not deter crime, the killing must stop. Murder and capital punishment are not opposites that cancel one another, but similars that breed their kind. Just as parents who beat their children often raise children who grow up to beat their own children, the death penalty teaches the appropriateness of killing.
Death begets death.
Because the institution of the death penalty declares on behalf of all of us that killing is right, the killing must stop. Sometime soon, Juan Raul Garza could become the first prisoner executed by the Federal Government since 1963. We mortals, when we put on black robes, take upon ourselves the power of life and death. We cannot create a life, but we arrogate to ourselves the power to end it. Our children have suffered greatly because of the actions of their father.