Capital Punishment

What do the words gassing, electric chair, lethal injection, firing squad, and hanging all have in common? They all trace back to the forms of capital punishment. Capital punishment is the execution of convicted criminals as a punishment for a crime that they have committed. Some may know this as the death penalty. Could you imagine you or someone that you loved strapped down in an electric chair, preparing for death? Capital punishment has been recorded since people first started writing down history. Many people do not support this form of punishment. According to the Hart Research Poll of police chiefs in the United States, they placed the death penalty last in how to reduce violent crime. Even so, the death penalty is still around today and many states and countries still allow it. Capital punishment is wrong to impose on people.
Capital punishment contradicts the “cruel and unusual” statement in the Bill of Rights. The Eighth Amendment of the United States Constitutions states, “Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and usual punishments inflicted”. The Online Wikipedia Encyclopedia acknowledged that by the twentieth century many people came to consider the death penalty to be a cruel and unusual act. Since then, twelve U.S. states have abolished capital punishment. Also, the Supreme Court has ruled out the ability to use the death penalty in certain circumstances. Not only that, but according to the Death Penalty Information Center (DPIC) on April 22, 1983 in Alabama a man named Jon Evans was executed. After an electrode attached to his leg burst, sparks and smoke came out from under the hood of his temple. The execution took fourteen minutes and three jolts of electricity. By the time John had died his flesh was burnt and his body was “smoldering”. John’s lawyer, Judge Russell F. Canan quoted that “Mr. Evans was being subjected to cruel and unusual punishment”.
Some people believe that it is better to kill a criminal, like a murder, because it will give the victim’s family less suffering. Haven’t you ever heard your mother say, “Two wrongs don’t make a right?” In this case, if the criminal killed someone and that was considered wrong, wouldn’t killing him be wrong too? If those two things are wrong, then by the idiom, it does not make the situation right. Also, it is a fact that by killing the murderer it will not bring the victim back to life. The victim is dead and will remain dead with or without executing the criminal. Killing the murder will make no difference to the victim.
Capital punishment also imposes the possibility of putting an innocent person to death. According to the DPIC, the criminal justice system is making errors, endangering innocent people from execution. 69 people have been released from death row since 1973 because their innocence had been discovered. If these people had not been proven innocent before their execution, then the criminal justice system would have killed 69 people who did not commit a crime. Also, in the work, The Case Against The Death Penalty, by Hugo Adam Bedau he quoted that “…there have been on the average more than four cases per year in which an entirely innocent person was convicted of murder. Scores of these persons were sentenced to death.”
Call it capital punishment or call it the death penalty. They both mean the same thing. They both are the same punishments involving the execution of convicted criminals and they are both wrong. This punishment has been around in the United States since colonial times and during that time a total of 13,000 people have been legally executed. The next time you think of capital punishment, think of the 13,000 people that were killed. Think of one of those 13,000 people being someone who you know. Maybe that person is your parent. Maybe that person is your son or daughter. Maybe that person is you. Capital punishment is still allowed in some areas. It is time to take a stand and let your voice be heard. Stop the death penalty.