Capital Punishment

I am an opponent of capital punishment. On the surface, the idea of making those guilty of taking someone else's life pay with their own seems to be one of simple, intuitively obvious justice. But there are a few problems I see with this.

First of all, the above argument falls apart when considering capital cases that don't deal with murder. For those crimes, there is NO compelling reason to consider capital punishment. But for the sake of argument, let's just consider the crime of murder. In our country at least, in order to get a death sentence for a murder, the convicted has to be shown to have committed the act in a premeditated way. Now it's going to be a lot easier to demonstrate that one killed another than it is to get inside the killer's mind and demonstrate, through a back-trail of their actions, some sort of premeditation. So the very thing that could sentence one to death (instead of life in prison) can be very subjective to determine. And the final determination thus may be made while unconsciously taking into account personal characteristics about the guilty that the judge and/or jury disapprove of. Things like race, speech, general appearance, tattoos, scars, facial expression, what part of the "tracks" they live on, and so on.

There is also evidence that African-Americans are given death sentences for first-degree murder convictions to a much higher degree than are others. For this reason alone, capital punishment should be abolished in favor of life in prison without parole. I'm no expert in law, but it seems to me that killing someone because of their race has to be the most extreme example of a civil rights violation!

And speaking of civil rights violations, even more repugnant (as repugnant as that is) than doling out differing life-or-death decisions based on race is executing those are are really innocent of their crimes. Recently, DNA testing has shown that many death row inmates were actually completely innocent! Now I know that the justice system can't be absolutely perfect, and that sometimes the innocent are wrongly convicted. But if an inmate is discovered to be innocent while in prison, he (or she) can still be released to enjoy the rest of their life in freedom. But once executed, there is no reversal of the error in justice, and the state has killed an innocent person!

Finally, I hear from time to time that capital punishment is a deterrent to murder. And maybe it is, at least marginally. But with the plague of murders committed in our country annually, especially in contrast with the relatively low incidence of murder in other Western nations, having the state selectively kill certain perpetrators (to me) completely skirts the problem. And the problem is that we, in our American society, promote, even extol violence. For some perverse reason, the idea is prevalent in our land that if someone wrongs you or even simply shows disrespect toward you, then you should (if you have any self-respect) retaliate by committing violence against the perceived offender. This goes all the way back to school-yard fights between kids. The kid who walks away from a taunt instead of fighting is usually branded a "sissy" or another derogatory term, which sometimes sticks with him for years. Popular TV series, movies and music that extol violence play a large role in fostering the culture of violence among the population. To me, it seems to be almost like a drug, for which some people have to continually get a "fix"!

There is one other aspect to capital punishment that I would like to raise. And that is the issue of "closure" for the murder victim's family and friends. I have noticed on many occasions that many years transpire between a convicted murderer being sentenced to death and the actual execution. In that period are numerous appeals and hearings. And these compel those who were close to the victim to attend them and repeatedly relive the trauma, sadness, and anger surrounding their loss. Although it may not satisfy the blood lust for revenge that some may feel against a murderer, a life sentence without parole would put closure at the time of sentencing and avoid the appeals and hearings that create so much unnecessary suffering. Then those families and friends could finally reach a sense of peace about their loss and go on with their lives.

So you see that I have quite a few reasons for opposing capital punishment. Do premeditated murderers deserve to die? Sure! But let's not be the ones who kill them. Let them be reminded each day for the rest of their lives why they have been put away from society in a locked cage!