essay about disagree in death penalty

Arguments for and Against the Death Penalty

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The death penalty deters future murders.

Retribution

A just society requires the taking of a life for a life.

The risk of executing the innocent precludes the use of the death penalty.

Arbitrariness & Discrimination

The death penalty is applied unfairly and should not be used.

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Federal Death Penalty

1. Legality

The United States is one of 55 countries globally with a legal death penalty, according to Amnesty International. As of Mar. 24, 2021, within the US, 27 states had a legal death penalty (though 3 of those states had a moratorium on the punishment’s use).

Proponents of the death penalty being legal argue that such a harsh penalty is needed for criminals who have committed the worst crimes, that the punishment deters crime, and that the US Supreme Court has upheld the death penalty as constitutional.

Opponents of the death penalty being legal argue that the punishment is cruel and unusual, and, thus, unconstitutional, that innocent people are put to death for crimes they did not commit, and that the penalty is disproportionately applied to people of color.

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Death Penalty: Arguments For and Against Essay

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Introduction

Arguments against death penalty, arguments for death penalty, death penalty policies around the world.

The area of the current research concerns the death penalty and whether it might be abolished in the future. Various experts have argued against the lethal sentence policies claiming that they are unethical, barbaric, and economically unfavorable. However, in the academic field, some authorities continue to justify this punishment method. The current research reviews various articles and websites concerning the lethal sentence controversies and establishes the correlation between the existing works. As a result, the main flaws within the present scholarship are the unresolved issue of whether death penalty policies are effective or not and whether there are any benefits to society from the lethal sentence. The authorities do not seem to find a consensus on this issue, but there is a prospect that this problem will be resolved in future works.

The first argument against the lethal sentence is a lack of deterrence among criminals. According to Amnesty International Australia (2019), there is no evidence that the prospect of death prevents potential perpetrators. Furthermore, some authorities state that the lethal sentence does not decline the number of crimes and is only used as an instrument of vengeance (Amnesty International, 1997). Another reason to cancel the death penalty is the unnecessary brutality of the process. Despite the introduction of less gruesome methods of killing, such as lethal injection, Deshwal (2017) claims that “sterilized and depersonalized methods of execution do not eliminate the brutality of the penalty” (para. 5). Finally, the majority of the population generally believes that lethal sentences are merely unethical and should be abolished (Jouet, 2020). Ultimately, most experts refer to the mentioned-above arguments to illustrate the obligation to cancel death penalties.

On the contrary, some authorities believe that the lethal sentence is necessary and is a useful tool to prevent potential crimes. The first argument supporting this perspective is retribution for the illegal activity. From the philosophical point of view, as mentioned by Immanuel Kant, the murderer should atone by giving up their own life (Flanders, 2013). Another reason for the lethal sentence is the probability that the perpetrator would kill again after prison. According to Radelet and Borg (2000), after the cancellation of most death penalties in America in 1972, about one percent of the criminals killed again. It might seem as an insignificant number, but ultimately the lethal sentence would have prevented it. As previously mentioned, the death penalty policy does not have evidence to deter people from criminal activity. However, public opinion frequently differs from the statistics gathered by experts. According to Seal (2017), throughout the twentieth-century people extensively considered that the death penalty is obligatory to prevent illegal activity. Therefore, some individuals would only feel safe and secure if the government practices the lethal sentence.

The attitude toward the death penalty varies depending on the regions of the world. In America, the lethal sentence for most crimes was canceled in 1972 by the Supreme Court (Nice, 1992). However, in multiple other countries, the death penalty policies still exist. For instance, while some regions ease restrictions and reduce the number of crimes that are punishable with the lethal sentence, China does the opposite (Lehmann, 2012). Up until the twenty-first century, the Chinese government has purposefully used the death penalty even for non-violent crimes, such as theft or bribes (Lehmann, 2012). Nevertheless, the overall number of countries that have abolished the lethal sentence is continually growing (Hood & Hoyle, 2009). Ultimately, the perspectives regarding the death penalty depend on the region, but more and more governments reject this type of punishment.

Summing up, the opinions about the death penalty vary vastly depending on the countries and the academic experts. Overall, this subject is extremely complicated since the effectiveness of death penalties in terms of criminal deterrence and prevention of potential crimes is almost impossible to prove, and, thus, various perspectives emerge. However, despite the complexity and sensitivity of the topic, most countries have discontinued this policy due to ethical and economical reasons.

Amnesty International. (1997). The death penalty: Criminality, justice and human rights . Refworld. Web.

Amnesty International Australia. (2019). Five reasons to abolish death penalty . Web.

Deshwal, S. (n.d.). Death penalty: Contemporary issues . Indian National Bar Association. Web.

Flanders, C. (2013). The case against the case against the death penalty. New Criminal Law Review: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal, 16 (4), 595-620.

Hood, R., & Hoyle, C. (2009). Abolishing the death penalty worldwide: The impact of a “new dynamic”. Crime and Justice, 38 (1), 1-63.

Jouet, M. (2020). Death penalty abolitionism from the enlightenment to modernity. American Journal of Comparative Law . Web.

Lehmann, E. (2012). The death penalty in a changing socialist state: Reflections on ‘modernity’ from the Mao Era to contemporary China. Honor Theses, 6 , 1-86.

Nice, C. D. (1992). The States and the death penalty. The Western Political Quarterly, 45 (4), 1037-1048.

Radelet, M. L., & Borg, M. J. (2000). The changing nature of death penalty debates. Annual Review of Sociology, 26 , 43-61.

Seal, L. (2017). Perceptions of safety, fear and social change in the public’s pro-death penalty discourse in mid twentieth-century Britain. Crime, Histoire & Sociétés / Crime, History & Societies, 21 (1), 1-24.

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Archive Issues

Journal of Practical Ethics

A journal of philosophy, applied to the real world.

The Death Penalty Debate: Four Problems and New Philosophical Perspectives

Masaki Ichinose

The University of Tokyo

This paper aims at bringing a new philosophical perspective to the current debate on the death penalty through a discussion of peculiar kinds of uncertainties that surround the death penalty. I focus on laying out the philosophical argument, with the aim of stimulating and restructuring the death penalty debate.

I will begin by describing views about punishment that argue in favour of either retaining the death penalty (‘retentionism’) or abolishing it (‘abolitionism’). I will then argue that we should not ignore the so-called “whom-question”, i.e. “To whom should we justify the system of punishment?” I identify three distinct chronological stages to address this problem, namely, “the Harm Stage”, “the Blame Stage”, and “the Danger Stage”.

I will also identify four problems arising from specific kinds of uncertainties present in current death penalty debates: (1) uncertainty in harm, (2) uncertainty in blame, (3) uncertainty in rights, and (4) uncertainty in causal consequences. In the course of examining these four problems, I will propose an ‘impossibilist’ position towards the death penalty, according to which the notion of the death penalty is inherently contradictory.

Finally, I will suggest that it may be possible to apply this philosophical perspective to the justice system more broadly, in particular to the maximalist approach to restorative justice.

1. To whom should punishment be justified?

What, exactly, are we doing when we justify a system of punishment? The process of justifying something is intrinsically connected with the process of persuading someone to accept it. When we justify a certain belief, our aim is to demonstrate reasonable grounds for people to believe it. Likewise, when we justify a system of taxation, we intend to demonstrate the necessity and fairness of the system to taxpayers.

What, then, are we justifying when we justify a system of punishment? To whom should we provide legitimate reasons for the system? It is easy to understand to whom we justify punishment when that punishment is administered by, for example, charging a fine. In this case, we persuade violators to pay the fine by bringing to their attention the harm that they have caused, harm which needs to be compensated. (Please note that I am only mentioning the primitive basis of the process of justification.) While we often generalise this process to include people in general or society as a whole, the process of justification would not work without convincing the people who are directly concerned (in this case, violators), at least theoretically, that this is a justified punishment, despite their subjective objections or psychological opposition. We could paraphrase this point per Scanlon’s ‘idea of a justification which it would be unreasonable to reject’ (1982, p.117). That is to say, in justifying the application of the system of punishment, we should satisfy the condition that each person concerned (especially the violator) is aware of having no grounds to reasonably reject the application of the system, even if they do in fact reject it from their personal, self-interested point of view.

In fact, if the violator is not theoretically persuaded at all in any sense—that is, if they cannot understand the justification as a justification—we must consider the possibility that they suffer some disorder or disability that affects their criminal responsibility.

We should also take into account the case of some extreme and fanatical terrorists. They might not understand the physical treatment inflicted on them in the name of punishment as a punishment at all. Rather, they might interpret their being physically harmed as an admirable result of their heroic behaviour. The notion of punishment is not easily applied to these cases, where the use of physical restraint is more like that applied to wild animals. Punishment can be successful only if those who are punished understand the event as punishment.

This line of argument entirely conforms to the traditional context in philosophy concerning the concept of a “person”, who is regarded as the moral and legal agent responsible for his or her actions, including crimes. John Locke, a 17th-century English philosopher, introduced and established this concept, basing it on ‘consciousness’. According to Locke, a person ‘is a thinking intelligent Being, that has reason and reflection, and can consider it self as it self, the same thinking thing in different times and places; which it does only by that consciousness’ (1975, Book 2, Chapter 27, Section 9). This suggests that moral or legal punishments for the person should be accompanied by consciousnesses (in a Lockean sense) of the agent. In other words, when punishment is legally imposed on someone, the person to be punished must be conscious of the punishment as a punishment; that is, the person should understand the event as a justified imposition of some harm. 1

However, there is a problem here, which arises in particular for the death penalty but not for other kinds of punishment. The question that I raise here is ‘to whom do we justify the death penalty?’ People might say it should be justified to society, as the death penalty is one of the social institutions to which we consent, whether explicitly or tacitly. This is true. However, if my claims above about justification are correct, the justification of the death penalty must involve the condemned convict coming to understand the justification at least at a theoretical level. Otherwise, to be executed would not be considered a punishment but rather something akin to the extermination of a dangerous animal. The question I want to focus on in particular is this: should this justification be provided before administering capital punishment or whilst administering capital punishment?

2. ‘Impossibilism’

Generally, in order for the justification of punishment to work, it is necessary for convicts to understand that this is a punishment before it is carried out and that they cannot reasonably reject the justification, regardless of any personal objection they may have. However, that is not sufficient, because if they do not understand at the moment of execution that something harmful being inflicted is a punishment, then its being inflicted would simply result in mere physical harm rather than an institutional response based on theoretical justification. The justification for punishment must be, at least theoretically, accepted both before and during its application. 2 This requirement can be achieved with regard to many types of punishment, such as fines or imprisonment. However, the situation is radically different in the case of the death penalty, for in this case, when it is carried out, the convict, by definition, disappears. During and (in the absence of an afterlife) after the punishment, the convict cannot understand the nature and justification of the punishment. Can we say then that this is a punishment? This is a question which deserves further thought.

On the one hand, the death penalty, once executed, logically implies the nonexistence of the person punished; therefore, by definition, that person will not be conscious of being punished at the moment of execution. However, punishment must be accompanied by the convict’s consciousness or understanding of the significance of the punishment, as far as we accept the traditional concept of the person as a moral and legal agent upon whom punishment could be imposed. It may be suggested that everything leading up to the execution—being on death row, entering the execution chamber, being strapped down—is a kind of punishment that the convict is conscious of and is qualitatively different from mere incarceration. However, those phases are factors merely concomitant with the death penalty. The core essence of being executed lies in being killed or dying. Therefore, if the phases of anticipation were to occur but finally the convict were not killed, the death penalty would not have been carried out. The death penalty logically results in the convict’s not being conscious of being executed, and yet, for it to be a punishment, the death penalty requires the convict to be conscious of being executed. We could notate this in the form of conjunction in the following way in order to make my point as clear as possible:

~ PCE & PCE

(PCE: ‘the person is conscious of being executed under the name of punishment’)

If this is correct, then we must conclude that the concept of the death penalty is a manifest contradiction in terms. In other words, the death penalty should be regarded as conceptually impossible, even before we take part in longstanding debates between retentionism and abolitionism. This purely philosophical view of the death penalty could be called ‘impossibilism’ (i.e. the death penalty is conceptually impossible), and could be classified as a third possible view on the death penalty, distinct from retentionism and abolitionism. A naïve objection against this impossibilist view might counter that the death penalty is actually carried out in some countries so that it is not impossible but obviously possible. The impossibilist answer to this objection is that, based on a coherent sense of what it means for a punishment to be justified, that execution in such countries is not the death penalty but rather unjustified lethal physical violence .

I am not entirely certain whether the ‘impossibilist’ view would truly make sense in the light of the contemporary debates on the death penalty. These debates take place between two camps as I referred to above:

Retentionism (the death penalty should be retained): generally argued with reference to victims’ feelings and the deterrence effects expected by execution.

Abolitionism (the death penalty should be abolished): generally argued through appeals to the cruelty of execution, the possibility of misjudgements in the trial etc.

The grounds mentioned by both camps are, theoretically speaking, applicable to punishment in general in addition to the death penalty specifically. I will mention those two camps later again in a more detailed way in order to make a contrast between standard debates and my own view. However, my argument above for ‘impossibilism’, does suggest that there is an uncertainty specific to the death penalty as opposed to other types of punishment. I believe that this uncertainty must be considered when we discuss the death penalty, at least from a philosophical perspective. Otherwise we may lose sight of what we are attempting to achieve.

A related idea to the ‘impossibilism’ of the death penalty may emerge, if we accept the fact that the death penalty is mainly imposed on those convicted of homicide. This idea is related to the understanding of death proposed by Epicurus, who provides the following argument (Diogenes Laertius 1925, p. 650-1):

Death, therefore, the most awful of evils, is nothing to us, seeing that, when we are, death is not come, and, when death is come, we are not. It is nothing, then, either to the living or to the dead, for with the living it is not and the dead exist no longer.

We can call this Epicurean view ‘the harmlessness theory of death’ (HTD). If we accept HTD, it follows, quite surprisingly, that there is no direct victim in the case of homicide insofar as we define ‘victim’ to be a person who suffers harm as a result of a crime. For according to HTD, people who have been killed and are now dead suffer nothing—neither benefits nor harms—because, as they do not exist, they cannot be victims. If this is true, there is no victim in the case of homicide, and it must be unreasonable to impose what is supposed to be the ultimate punishment 3 —that is, the death penalty—on those offenders who have killed others.

This argument might sound utterly absurd, particularly if it is extended beyond offenders and victims to people in general, as one merit of the death penalty seems to lie in reducing people’s fear of death by homicide. However, although this argument from HTD might sound bizarre and counterintuitive, we should accept it at the theoretical level, to the extent that we find HTD valid. 4 Clearly, this argument, which is based on the nonexistence of victims, could logically lead to another impossibilist argument concerning the death penalty.

There are many points to be more carefully examined regarding both types of ‘impossibilism’, which I will skip here. However, I must stop to ponder a natural reaction. My question above, ‘To whom do we justify?’, which introduced ‘impossibilism’, might sound eccentric, because, roughly speaking, theoretical arguments of justification are usually deployed in a generalised way and do not need to acknowledge who those arguments are directed at. Yet, I believe that this normal attitude towards justification is not always correct. Instead, our behaviour, when justifying something, focuses primarily on theoretically persuading those who are unwilling to accept the item being justified. If nobody refuses to accept it, then it is completely unnecessary to provide its justification. For instance, to use a common sense example, nobody doubts the existence of the earth. Therefore, nobody takes it to be necessary to justify the existence of the earth. Alternatively, a justification for keeping coal-fired power generation, the continued use of which is not universally accepted due to global warming, is deemed necessary. In other words, justification is not a procedure lacking a particular addressee, but an activity that addresses the particular person in a definite way, at least at first. In fact, it seems to me that the reason that current debates on the death penalty become deadlocked is that crucial distinctions are not appropriately made. I think that such a situation originates from not clearly asking to whom we are addressing our arguments, or whom we are discussing. As far as I know, there have been very few arguments within the death penalty debate that take into account the homicide victim, despite the victim’s unique status in the issue. This is one example where the debate can be accused of ignoring the ‘whom-question’, so I will clarify this issue by adopting a strategy in which this ‘whom-question’ is addressed.

3. Three chronological stages

Following my strategy, I will first introduce a distinction between three chronological stages in the death penalty. In order to make my argument as simple as possible, I will assume that the death penalty is imposed on those who have been convicted of homicide, although I acknowledge there are other crimes which could result in the death penalty. In that sense, the three stages of the death penalty correspond to the three distinct phases arising from homicide.

The first stage takes place at the time of killing; the fact that someone was killed must be highlighted. However, precisely what happened? If we accept the HTD, we should suppose that nothing harmful happened in the case of homicide. Although counterintuitive, let’s see where this argument leads. However, first, I will acknowledge that we cannot cover all contexts concerning the justification of the death penalty by discussing whether or not killing harms the killed victim. Even if we accept for argument’s sake that homicide does not harm the victim, that is only part of the issue. Other people, particularly the bereaved families of those killed, are seriously harmed by homicide. More generally, society as a whole is harmed, as the fear of homicide becomes more widespread in society.

Moreover, our basic premise, HTD, is controversial. Whether HTD is convincing remains an unanswered question. There is still a very real possibility that those who were killed do suffer harm in a straightforward sense, which conforms to most people’s strong intuition. In any event, we can call this first stage, the ‘Harm Stage’, because harm is what is most salient in this phase, either harm to the victims or others in society at large. If a justification for the death penalty is to take this Harm Stage seriously, the overwhelming focus must be on the direct victims themselves, who actually suffer the harm. This is the central core of the issue, as well as the starting point of all further problems.

The second stage appears after the killing. After a homicide, it is common to blame and to feel anger towards the perpetrator or perpetrators, and this can be described as a natural, moral, or emotional reaction. However, it is not proven that blaming or feeling angry is indeed natural, as it has not been proven that such feelings would arise irrespective of our cultural understanding of the social significance of killing. The phenomenon of blaming and the prevalence of anger when a homicide is committed could be a culture-laden phenomenon rather than a natural emotion. Nevertheless, many people actually do blame perpetrators or feel anger towards them for killing someone, and this is one of the basic ideas used to justify a system of ‘retributive justice’. The core of retributive justice is that punishment should be imposed on the offenders themselves (rather than other people, such as the offenders’ family). This retributive impulse seems to be the most fundamental basis of the system of punishment, even though we often also rely on some consequentialist justification favor punishment (e.g. preventing someone from repeating an offence). In addition, offenders are the recipients of blame or anger from society, which suggests that blaming or expressing anger has a crucial function in retributive justice. I will call this second phase the ‘Blame Stage’, which extends to the period of the execution. Actually, the act of blaming seems to delineate what needs to be resolved in this phase. Attempting to justify the death penalty by acknowledging this Blame Stage (or retributive justification) in terms of proportionality is the most common strategy. That is to say, lex talionis applies here—‘an eye for an eye’. This is the justification that not only considers people in general, including victims who blame perpetrators, but also attempts to persuade perpetrators that this is retribution resulting from their own harmful behaviours.

The final stage in the process concerning the death penalty appears after the execution; in this stage, what matters most is how beneficial the execution is to society. Any system in our society must be considered in the light of its cost-effectiveness. This extends even to cultural or artistic institutions, although at first glance they seem to be far from producing any practical effects. In this context, benefits are interpreted quite broadly; creating intellectual satisfaction, for example, is counted as a benefit. Clearly, this is a utilitarian standpoint. We can apply this view to the system of punishment, or the death penalty, if it is accepted. That is, the death penalty may be justified if its benefits to society are higher than its costs. What, then, are the costs, and what are the benefits? Obviously, we must consider basic expenses, such as the maintenance and labour costs of the institution keeping the prisoner on death row. However, in the case of the death penalty, there is a special cost to be considered, namely, the emotional reaction of people in society in response to killing humans, even when officially sanctioned as a punishment. Some feel that it is cruel to kill a person, regardless of the reason.

On the other hand, what is the expected benefit of the death penalty? The ‘deterrent effect’ is usually mentioned as a benefit that the death penalty can bring about in the future. In that case, what needs to be shown if we are to draw analogies with the previous two stages? When people try to justify the death penalty by mentioning its deterrent effect, they seem to be comparing a society without the death penalty to one with the death penalty. Then they argue that citizens in a society with the death penalty are at less risk of being killed or seriously victimised than those in a society without the death penalty. In other words, the death penalty could reduce the danger of being killed or seriously victimised in the future. Therefore, we could call this third phase the ‘Danger Stage’. In this stage, we focus on the danger that might affect people in the future, including future generations. This is a radically different circumstance from those of the previous two stages in that the Danger Stage targets people who have nothing to do with a particular homicide.

4. Analogy from natural disasters

The three chronological stages that I have presented in relation to the death penalty are found in other types of punishment as well. Initially, any punishment must stem from some level of harm (including harm to the law), and this is a sine qua non for the issue of punishment to arise. Blaming and its retributive reaction must follow that harm, and subsequently some social deterrent is expected to result. However, we should carefully distinguish between the death penalty and other forms of punishment. With other forms of punishment, direct victims undoubtedly exist, and those convicted of harming such victims are aware they are being punished. In addition, rehabilitating perpetrators in order for them to return to society—one aspect of the deterrent effect—can work in principle. However, this aspect of deterrence cannot apply to the death penalty because executed criminals cannot be aware of being punished by definition, and the notion of rehabilitation does not make sense by definition. Only this quite obvious observation can clarify that there is a crucial, intrinsic difference or distinction between the death penalty and other forms of punishment. Theories about the death penalty must seriously consider this difference; we cannot rely on theories that treat the death penalty on a par with other forms of punishment.

Moreover, the three chronological stages that have been introduced above are fundamentally different from each other. In reality, the subjects or people that we discuss and on whom we focus are different from stage to stage. In this respect, one of my points in this article is to underline the crucial need to discuss the issues of the death penalty by drawing a clear distinction between those stages. I am not claiming that only one of those stages is important. I am aware that each stage has its own significance; therefore, we should consider all three. However, we should be conscious of the distinctions when discussing the death penalty.

To make my point more understandable, I will suggest an analogy with natural disasters. Specifically, I will use as an analogy the biggest earthquake in Japan in the past millennium—the quake of 11 March 2011 (hereafter the 2011 quake). Of course, at first glance, earthquakes are substantially different from homicides. However, there is a close similarity between the 2011 quake and homicides, because although most of the harm that occurred was due to the earthquake and tsunami, in fact people were also harmed and killed during the 2011 quake at least partially due to human errors, such as the failure of the government’s policy on tsunamis and nuclear power plants. Thus, it is quite easy in the case of the 2011 quake to distinguish between three aspects, all of which are different from each other.

(1) We must recognise victims who were killed in the tsunami or suffered hardship at shelters. 5 This is the core as well as the starting point of all problems. What matters here is rescuing victims, and expressing our condolences.

(2) Then we will consider victims and people in general who hold the government and the nuclear power company responsible for political and technical mistakes. What usually matters here is the issue of responsibility and compensation.

(3) Finally, we can consider people’s interests in improving preventive measures taken to reduce damages by tsunami and nuclear-plant-related accidents in the future. What matters in this context is the reduction of danger in the future by learning from the 2011 quake.

Nobody will fail to notice that these three aspects are three completely different issues, which can be seen in exactly the same manner in the case of the death penalty. Aspects (1), (2), and (3) correspond respectively to the Harm Stage, the Blame Stage, and the Danger Stage. Undoubtedly, none of these three aspects should be ignored and they actually appear in a mutually intertwined manner: the more successful the preventive measures are, the fewer victims will be produced by tsunami and nuclear-plant accidents in the future. Those aspects affect each other. Likewise, we must consider each of the three stages regarding the death penalty.

5. Initial harm

The arguments thus far provide the basic standpoint that I want to propose concerning the debates on the death penalty. I want to investigate the issue of the death penalty by sharply distinguishing between these three stages and by simultaneously considering them all equally. By following this strategy, I will demonstrate that there are intrinsic uncertainties, and four problems resulting from those uncertainties, in the system of the death penalty. In so doing I will raise a novel objection to the contemporary debate over the death penalty.

Roughly speaking, as I have previously mentioned, the death penalty debate continues to involve the two opposing views of abolitionism and retentionism (or perhaps, in the case of abolitionist countries, revivalism). It seems that the main arguments to support or justify each of the two traditional views (which I have briefly described in section 2 above) have already been exhausted. What matters in this context is whether the death penalty can be justified, and then whether—if it is justifiable—it should be justified in terms of retributivism or utilitarianism. That is the standard way of the debate on the death penalty. For example, when the retributive standpoint is used to justify the death penalty, the notion of proportionality as an element of fairness or social justice might be relevant, apart from the issue of whether proportionality should be measured cardinally or ordinally (see von Hirsch 1993, pp. 6-19). In other words, if one person has killed another, then that person too ought to be killed—that is, executed—in order to achieve fairness. However, as other scholars such as Tonry (1994) have argued, it is rather problematic to apply the notion of proportionality to the practice of punishment because it seems that there is no objective measure of offence, culpability, or responsibility. Rather, the notion of parsimony 6 is often mentioned in these contexts as a more practical and fairer principle than the notion of proportionality.

However, according to my argument above, such debates are inadequate if they are simply applied to the case of the death penalty. Proportionality between which two things is being discussed? Most likely, what is considered here is the proportionality between harm by homicide (where the measured value of offence might be the maximum) and harm by execution. However, I want to reconfirm the essential point. What specifically is the harm of homicide? Whom are we talking about when we discuss the harm of homicide? As I previously argued, citing Epicurus and his HTD, there is a metaphysical doubt about whether we should regard death as harmful. If a person simply disappears when he or she dies and death is completely harmless as HTD claims, then it seems that the retributive justification for the death penalty in terms of proportionality must be nonsense, for nothing at all happens that should trigger the process of crime and punishment. Of course, following HTD, the execution should be similarly regarded as nonsensical. However, if that is the case, the entire institutional procedure, from the perpetrator’s arrest to his or her execution, must be considered a tremendous waste of time, labour, and money.

Some may think that these kinds of arguments are merely empty philosophical abstractions. That may be. However, it is not the case that there is nothing plausible to be considered in these arguments. Consider the issue of euthanasia. Why do people sometimes wish to be euthanised? It is because people can be relieved of a painful situation by dying. That is to say, people wishing to be euthanised take death to be painless, i.e. harmless, in the same manner as HTD. This idea embedded in the case of euthanasia is so understandable that the issue of euthanasia is one of the most popular topics in ethics; however, if so, Epicurus’s HTD should not be taken as nonsensical, for HTD holds in the same way as the idea embedded in the case of euthanasia that when we die, we have neither pain nor any other feeling. What I intend to highlight here is that we must be acutely aware that there is a fundamental problem concerning the notion of harm by homicide, if we want to be philosophically sincere and consistent 7 .

In other words, I assert that the contemporary debate over the death penalty tends to lack proper consideration for the Harm Stage in which victims themselves essentially matter, although that stage must be the very starting point of all issues. We must understand this pivotal role of the Harm Stage before intelligently discussing the death penalty. Of course, in practice, we can discuss the death penalty in a significant and refined manner without investigating the Harm Stage. For example, according to Goldman, one of the plausible positions regarding the justification for punishment in general is a position that combines both retributivism and utilitarianism. Mentioning John Rawls and H. L. A. Hart, Goldman writes (1995, p. 31):

Some philosophers have thought that objections to these two theories of punishment could be overcome by making both retributive and utilitarian criteria necessary for the justification of punishment. Utilitarian criteria could be used to justify the institution, and retributive to justify specific acts within it.

Goldman argues, however, that this mixed position could result in a paradox regarding how severe the punishment to be imposed on the guilty should be, even though this position avoids punishing the innocent (ibid., p.36):

While the mixed theory can avoid punishment of the innocent, it is doubtful that it can avoid excessive punishment of the guilty if it is to have sufficient effect to make the social cost worthwhile.

This argument is useful in providing a moral and legal warning to society not to punish offenders more severely than they deserve, even if that punishment is more effective in deterring future crimes. I frankly admit that Goldman’s suggestion goes to the essence of the concept of justice. However, I must also say that if his argument is applied to the death penalty, then it has not yet touched the fundamental question that forms the basis of the whole issue: whose harm should we discuss? Is it appropriate not to discuss the Harm Stage? Alternatively, I am raising the following question: who is the victim of homicide? At the very least, I think we should admit that this very question is the crucial one constituting the first problem on the death penalty, the Uncertainty of Harm.

6. Feeling of being victimised

Next, I will examine another kind of uncertainty that is specific to the Blame Stage; the idea of retribution matters here. As far as the Japanese context for the death penalty is concerned, according to statistical surveys of public opinion, people tend to strongly support the death penalty in the case of particularly violent homicides in which they are probably feeling particularly victimised. If the death penalty were abolished, it seems that the abolition would be extremely unfair to victims of homicide, as the rights of victims (i.e. rights of life, liberty, property, and so on) would be denied by being killed, whereas those of perpetrators would be excessively protected. Obviously, the notion of retributive proportionality or equilibrium is the basis for this argument. To put it another way, this logic of retribution aims at justifying the death penalty in terms of its achieving equilibrium between the violated rights of victims and the deprived rights of perpetrators in the name of punishment. Is this logic perfectly acceptable? Emotionally speaking, I want to say yes. We Japanese might even say that perpetrators should gallantly and bravely kill themselves to take responsibility for their actions, as we have a history of the samurai who were expected to conduct hara-kiri when they did something shameful. However, theoretically speaking, we cannot accept this logic immediately, because there are too many doubtful points. Those doubts as a whole constitute the second problem concerning the death penalty.

First, we must ask, as well as in the previous section, on the issue of feeling victimised, whom are we discussing? Whose feelings and whose rights matter? Direct victims in the case of homicide do not exist by definition. Then a question arises: why can substitutes (prosecutors and others) or the bereaved family ask for the death penalty based on their feelings rather than the direct victim’s feeling? How are they qualified to ask for such a stringent punishment when they were not the ones killed? The crucial point to be noted here is that the bereaved family is not identical with the direct victim. Second, even if it is admitted that the notion of the victim’s emotional harm are relevant to sentencing (and at least in the sense of emotional harm the bereaved family’s suffering I would agree that this makes them certainly the principal victims even if not the direct victim), it must be asked: can we justify an institution based on a feeling? This question is a part of the traditional debate concerning the moral sense theory. We have repeatedly asked whether social institutions can be based on moral sense or human feeling, when such sense or feeling cannot help but be arbitrary because those, after all, are subjective. The question is still unanswered. Third, if the feelings of being victimised justify the death penalty, then could an accidental killing or involuntary manslaughter be included in crimes that deserve the death penalty? Actually, the feelings of the bereaved family in the case of accidental killing could be qualitatively the same as in the case of voluntary homicide. However, even countries which adopt the death penalty do not usually prescribe that execution is warranted for accidental killing. Fourth, I wonder whether the bereaved family who feel victimised always desire the execution of the killer. It could be that they consider resuming their daily lives more important than advocating the execution of the murderer who killed their family member. As a matter of practical fact, executions of perpetrators need have nothing to do with supporting bereaved families. Fifth, if we accept the logic in which the death penalty is justified by the bereaved family’s feeling of being victimised, how should we deal with cases where the person who was killed was alone in the world, with no family? If there is no bereaved family, then no one feels victimised. Is the death penalty unwarranted in this case? In any case, as these questions suggest, we should be aware that retributive justification based upon the feeling of being victimised is not as acceptable as we initially expected. Once again, there is uncertainty here. Uncertainty of blame leads to the second problem concerning the death penalty.

7. Violation and forfeiture

Of course, the retributive justification for the death penalty does not have to depend upon the feeling of being victimised alone, even if the primitive basis for it might lie in human emotion. The theoretical terminology of human rights themselves (rather than emotional feeling based on the notion of rights) could be used as justification: if a person violates another’s rights (to property, freedom, a healthy life, etc.), then that person must forfeit his or her own rights in proportion to the violated rights. This can be regarded as a formulation of the system of punishment established in the modern era that is theoretically based upon the social contract theory. The next remark of Goldman confirms this point (1995, p.33):

If we are asked which rights are forfeited in violating the rights of others, it is plausible to answer just those rights that one violates (or an equivalent set). One continues to enjoy rights only as long as one respects those rights in others: violation constitutes forfeiture . . . Since deprivation of those particular rights violated is often impracticable, we are justified in depriving a wrongdoer of some equivalent set, or in inflicting harm equivalent to that which would be suffered in losing those same rights.

However, the situation is not so simple, particularly in connection with the death penalty. In order to clarify this point, we have to reflect, albeit briefly, on how the concept of human rights has been historically established. I will trace the origin of the concept of human rights by referring to Fagan’s overall explanation. According to Fagan (2016, Section 2):

Human rights rest upon moral universalism and the belief in the existence of a truly universal moral community comprising all human beings . . . The origins of moral universalism within Europe are typically associated with the writings of Aristotle and the Stoics.

Followed by the remark:

Aristotle unambiguously expounds an argument in support of the existence of a natural moral order. This natural order ought to provide the basis for all truly rational systems of justice . . . The Stoics thereby posited the existence of a universal moral community effected through our shared relationship with god. The belief in the existence of a universal moral community was maintained in Europe by Christianity over the ensuing centuries.

This classical idea was linked during the 17th and 18th centuries to the concept of ‘natural law’ including the notion of ‘natural rights’ that each human being possesses independently of society or policy. ‘The quintessential exponent of this position was John Locke . . . Locke argued that natural rights flowed from natural law. Natural law originated from God’ (ibid.). Fagan continues (ibid.):

Analyses of the historical predecessors of the contemporary theory of human rights typically accord a high degree of importance to Locke’s contribution. Certainly, Locke provided the precedent of establishing legitimate political authority upon a rights foundation. This is an undeniably essential component of human rights.

Although, of course, we should take post-Lockean improvement including Kantian ideas into account to fully understand contemporary concepts of human rights, we cannot deny that Locke’s philosophy ought to be considered first.

As is well known, Locke’s argument focuses on property rights. He put forth the idea that property rights were based on our labour. Thus, his theory is called ‘the labour theory of property rights’. Let me quote the famous passage I have in mind (Locke 1960, Second Treatise, Section 27):

Though the Earth, and all inferior Creatures be common to all Men, yet every Man has a Property in his own Person. This no Body has any Right to but himself. The Labour of his Body, and the Works of his Hands, we may say, are properly his.

This idea could cover any kind of human rights such as those for living a healthy life, liberty, and property, because human rights are supposed to be owned by us. For example, H. L.A. Hart once argued that legal rights are nothing but legal powers to require others to meet correlative obligations, and then pointed out that; ‘we also speak of the person who has the correlative right as possessing it or even owning it’ (Hart 1982, p.185). If this is the case, we can make property rights representative of all human rights.

However, if we follow Locke’s theory (and many countries, including Japan, still do), then it logically follows that what we cannot gain by our labour by definition cannot be objects of human rights. How does Locke’s idea apply to our life itself (rather than simply living a healthy life)? Are we able to acquire our life itself by our labour? No, we cannot. We can realise a healthy life by making an effort to be moderate, but we cannot create our lives. We are creatures or animals; therefore, our lives are not something that we ourselves made by our labour. Locke uses the concept of power (as Hart does) when he discusses various aspects of property rights. Among those, we should pay particular attention to the following (Locke 1960, Second Treatise, Section 23):

For a Man, not having the Power of his own life, cannot, by Compact, or his own Consent, enslave himself to any one, nor put himself under the Absolute, Arbitrary Power of another, to take away his Life, when he pleases.

Locke also wri tes (1960, Section 24):

No Man can, by agreement, pass over to another that which he hath not in himself, a Power over his own life.

Obviously, Locke assumes that we have no property rights over our own lives or bodies themselves, or more precisely, no property rights in controlling and destroying our own lives as a whole; therefore, we cannot alienate those rights to others. We cannot alienate or forfeit what we do not have. If this is the case and we presuppose the formulation of the system of punishment introduced above in terms of violation and forfeiture, what would result? The answer is clear. Our lives themselves are conceptually beyond the terminology of human rights, and thus, if the death penalty is defined as a punishment requiring the forfeiture of the perpetrator’s right to life, the death penalty should be regarded as conceptually contradictory or impossible. We cannot lose tails, as we do not have tails. Likewise, we cannot own our lives (i.e. we have no property rights in our life itself), so we cannot lose our lives, at least in such a sense as forfeiture of human rights. This is the third route to an ‘impossibilist’ view of the death penalty. This argument depends heavily on Locke’s original theory. Nevertheless, as long as we have to consider Locke’s classical view seriously in order to discuss the relation between punishment and human rights, we must be aware that we could be involved in theoretical uncertainty in justifying the death penalty through the notion of human rights in a retributivist flavour, as the argument thus far suggests. This is the very puzzle that I want to propose as the third problem concerning the death penalty debates.

Moreover, we must acknowledge that retributive ideas in the Blame Stage usually include a kind of evaluation of the psychological state of the agent’s behaviour at the time of the crime as a matter of legal fact. In other words, rationality, freedom, or mens rea are usually needed for agents to be judged guilty. However, from a strictly philosophical perspective, we should say that it is far from easy in principle to confirm those states in the past. Indeed, this psychological trend seems to cause controversy in court proceedings, as seen, for example, in the American context known as ‘battered-woman syndrome’. If a woman who has been routinely battered by her partner suddenly fights back and kills her partner, American courts often find her not guilty. People wonder whether such an evaluation concerning battered women could be correctly made without arbitrariness. Additionally, philosophical debates on free will and the development of the brain sciences must be considered. Some philosophers assert that we have no free will because our personality and actions are intrinsically governed by external factors, such as our environments or biological conditions, which are definitely beyond our control. This philosophical standpoint is often called ‘hard incompatibilism’ (see Strawson 2008). In this respect, my analogy to a natural disaster could be seen as appropriate, as our actions might be taken to be just natural phenomena at the end of the day. 8 Furthermore, brain sciences often provide shocking data to suggest that our will may be controlled by brain phenomena occurring prior to our consciousness, as shown by Benjamin Libet. In view of such contemporary arguments, we have little choice but to say that we cannot be perfectly certain whether a given perpetrator who committed homicide is truly guilty, as long as we adopt the present standard for judging the psychological states of offenders in court. To sum up, the third problem for the death penalty is the difficulty in knowing whether someone has property in their life itself as well as uncertainty about the mental state of the accused, this is the Uncertainty of Rights Violation.

8. The deterrent effect

Finally, I will examine some problems in the Danger Stage. What matters in this context is the utilitarian justification for the death penalty; I will focus on what is called the ‘deterrent effect’. Firstly, I would like to say that the death penalty undoubtedly has some deterrent effect. This is obvious if we imagine a society where violators of any laws, including minor infractions such as a parking ticket or public urination, must be sentenced to death. I believe that the number of all crimes would dramatically reduce in that society, although it would constitute a horrible dystopia. The argument for the deterrent effect of the death penalty probably arises from the same line of ‘common sense’ thinking. For example, Pojman says, ‘there is some non-statistical evidence based on common sense that gives credence to the hypothesis that the threat of the death penalty deters and that it does so better than long prison sentences’ (Pojman 1998, pp. 38-39). Specifically, this deterrent effect presupposes the utility calculus that a human being conducts, whether consciously or unconsciously, in terms of ‘weighing the subjective severity of perceived censure and the subjective probability of perceived censure against the magnitude of the desire to commit the offence and the subjective probability of fulfilling this desire by offending’ (Beyleveld 1979, p. 219). Therefore, if we presuppose the basic similarity of human conditions, it may be plausible to state the following about the deterrent effect of punishment: ‘this can be known a priori on the basis of an analysis of human action’ (ibid., p. 215). However, in fact, the death penalty in many countries is restricted to especially heinous crimes, such as consecutive homicides (although some countries apply the death penalty to a wider range of crimes), which suggests that we must conduct empirical studies, case by case, if we want to confirm the deterrent effect of the death penalty. Therefore, the question to be asked regarding the deterrent effect is not whether the death penalty is actually effective, but rather how effective it is in restricted categories of crimes. What matters is the degree.

There are many statistical surveys concerning this issue. In particular, an economic investigation by Ehrlich is often mentioned as a typical example. After examining detailed statistical data and taking into account various factors, such as race, heredity, education, and cultural patterns, Ehrlich suggest s (1975, p. 414):

An additional execution per year over the period in question [i.e., 1935-1969] may have resulted, on average, in 7 or 8 fewer murders.

Of course, this estimate includes too many factors and presumptions to be perfectly correct. Ehrlich himself is aware of this and thus says (ibid.):

It should be emphasized that the expected tradeoffs computed in the preceding illustration mainly serve a methodological purpose since their validity is conditional upon that of the entire set of assumptions underlying the econometric investigation … however … the tradeoffs between executions and murders implied by these elasticities are not negligible, especially when evaluated at relatively low levels of executions and relatively high level[s] of murder.

Ehrlich’s study drew considerable criticism, most of which pointed out deficiencies in his statistical methodology. Therefore, at this moment, we should say that we are able to infer nothing definite from Ehrlich’s study, although we must value the study as pioneering work.

Van den Haag proposes an interesting argument based upon uncertainty specific to the deterrent effect of the death penalty. He assumes two cases, namely, case (1), in which the death penalty exists, and case (2), in which the death penalty does not exist. In each case there is risk or uncertainty. On the one hand, in case (1), if there is no deterrent effect, the life of a murderer is lost in vain, whereas if there is a deterrent effect, the lives of some murderers and innocent victims will be saved in the future. On the other hand, in case (2), if there is no deterrent effect, the life of a convicted murderer is saved, whereas if there is a deterrent effect, the lives of some innocent victims will be lost in the future (Van den Haag 1995, pp. 133-134). Conway and Pojman explain this argument using the following table, ‘The Best Bet Argument’, which I have modified slightly, having DP stand for the death penalty, and DE the deterrent effect:

save: murderers and innocent

victims in the future

lose: convicted murderer

save: nothing affected

lose: convicted murderer

save: convicted murderer

lose: innocent victims in the

future

save: convicted murderer

lose: nothing affected

Following this table, Conway assumes (after Van den Haag’s suggestion that the life of a convicted murderer is not valued more highly than that of the unknown victims) numerical values about each case (each numerical number stands for not a number of people but a hypothetical value for a person to be saved or killed) :

a murderer saved +5

a murderer executed -5

an innocent saved +10

an innocent murdered -10

Moreover, he assumes that for each execution, only two innocent lives are spared (i.e. he assumes the deterrent effect to be almost the minimum). Then, consequently, executing convicted murderers turns out to be a good bet (Conway 1995, pp. 265-266; Pojman 1998, pp. 40-41).

9. Negative causation and where to give priority

Van den Haag’s ‘Best Bet Argument’ sounds quite interesting. However, Conway has already proposed a fundamental challenge to this argument: it mistakenly regards the actual death of convicted murderers as being on a par with the possible death of innocent victims in the future (Conway 1995, pp. 269-270). This is confusing or possibly a rhetorical sleight of hand. I think that Conway’s reaction to Van den Haag’s argument is a reasonable one.

As I approach my conclusion, I will propose two problems with Van den Haag’s argument. First, I want to acknowledge that any arguments, including Van den Haag’s, supporting the death penalty in terms of its deterrent effect seem to presuppose a causal relationship between the existence of the death penalty and people not killing others. For example, Pojman writes, ‘the repeated announcement and regular exercise of capital punishment may have deep causal influence’ (1998, p. 48). However, epistemologically speaking, that presupposition is extremely hard to confirm, because the effect of this causal relationship is not a positive, but rather a negative event, which is the event of not killing others. This has something to do with the philosophical problem of how to understand negative properties. By negative properties we mean that, for example, my room is not full of seawater; my room does not consist of paper; my room is not melting us, etc. Such descriptions by negative properties can be made almost endlessly. In other words, one identical event described by a positive property (e.g., this room is well lit) can be re-described in infinite ways in terms of negative properties. Take the example that I am now at my computer in Tokyo, writing a paper. This event can also be described as ‘I am not eating’, ‘I am not sleeping’, ‘I am not killing others’ (!), etc. The positive event, ‘I am writing a paper now’, can be understood through a causal relationship. The event was most likely caused by my intention to do so, which was caused by my sense of duty as a professor, etc. How, then, could we understand the negative description of my action, ‘I am not killing others’? Was this caused by the existence of the death penalty in Japan?

Perhaps I was completely unaware of the existence of the death penalty in Japan when I wrote a paper without killing others. Could the death penalty be its cause? Could the negative event ‘I am not killing others’ be an effect of the death penalty? It is hard to say so.

This problem is the same as the problem of ‘causation by absence’ or ‘omission-involving causation’. Generally, causation by absence is usually examined in the form of answering a question about whether nothingness can cause something. For example, David Lewis discusses a question about how a void (understood as being entirely empty or nothing at all, differing from a vacuum) is regarded as a cause of something (Lewis 2004). He says, ‘If you were cast into a void, it would cause you to die in just a few minutes. It would suck the air from your lungs. It would boil your blood. It would drain the warmth from your body. And it would inflate enclosures in your body until they burst’ (ibid., p.277). However, the problem is that the void is nothing. ‘When the void sucks away the air, it does not exert an attractive force on the air’ (ibid.). Furthermore, another, perhaps harder problem would arise. We can say, ‘If I defended you from being cast into a void, you would not die’. Namely, my omission to defend you would cause you to die. However, should only my omission matter? What of your brother’s omission to defend you? Or the Prime Minister of the UK’s omission to defend you? Are not all of those qualified to be the cause of your death, as least as long as we adopt a common-sense counterfactual analysis of causation? As this argument suggests, in the context of the current debate on this problem, the most troublesome phase is that ‘too many’ absences can be supposed to cause a particular effect. I quote Menzies, who says (2004, p.145):

I am writing this essay at my computer. If, however, there were nerve gas in the air, or I were attacked with flamethrowers, or struck by a meteor shower, I would not be writing the essay. But it is counterintuitive to say that the absence of nerve gas, flamethrower attack, and meteor strike are causes of my writing the essay.

This example takes the issue of absence as a cause, but simultaneously his example refers to the case of effect as absence (not writing the essay). As this shows, the current debate on the problem of causation by absence could extend to the case of effect as absence. In any case, what matters is a possibility that ‘too many’ absences can cause something, and something can cause ‘too many’ absences (Menzies calls this problem ‘the problem of profligate causation’ (ibid., pp.142-145). Then the deterrent effect of the death penalty is definitely classified as a case of absence as effect rather than cause. In other words, the absence of homicide (as effect) matters, whereas in this case execution (as cause) is presupposed to exist. It seems that the current debate on causation by absence is highly likely to contribute to discussing the problem of the deterrent effect.

Of course, someone may counter my argument by saying that what matters in this context is a statistical correlation between the number of executions and the number of homicides, which could be confirmed in an empirical way. I admit that the statistical correlation plays a crucial role here, even though we must simultaneously acknowledge that what is called ‘randomized controlled trial’, the most reliable, statistical methodology to confirm causal relations, is unfeasible due to the nature of the problem. Actually, this kind of correlation is too rough to predict the causal relationship between those, although the causation really matters. Causes of a reduction or increase in the number of homicides can be interpreted or estimated in various ways, considering confounding factors, such as education, economic situation, urban planning, and so on. Therefore, in principle, there always remains the possibility that the apparent correlation between the death penalty and the reduction of homicides is merely accidental. For example, there may be another, common cause, that brings about both people’s tendency to support the death penalty and the reduction of homicides 9 . We should recognise that there is intrinsic uncertainty here. These difficulties concerning causal relations give rise to a fourth problem related to the death penalty debates – the Uncertainty of Causal Consequences.

Incidentally, let me now return to my distinction of the three stages regarding the death penalty. Obviously, the issue of the deterrent effect belongs primarily to the Danger Stage. Yet it is vital to consider the Harm Stage. How can the deterrent effect affect the Harm Stage? I must say that the retentionist’s argument, in terms of the deterrent effect of the death penalty, completely dismisses this essential point. We need only recall the analogy of the 2011 quake in Japan. ‘Retentionism’ based upon the deterrent effect corresponds to aspect (3), where the improvement of the preventive system matters. This is important, of course, but cannot be a priority. Priority lies in the issues of how to deal with the actual harm that the victims have already suffered (specifically referring to the bereaved family or others in the case of homicide and the death penalty). Without consideration of how to cope with the harm, even if the theory seriously considers the innocent victims in the future, the retentionists’ theory can hardly be persuasive.

It is true that the retentionists’ theory based on the deterrent effect appropriately considers the person harmed in the process of punishment. For example, Walker considers such a phase in the process of punishment as one of the possible objections against retentionism based on the deterrent effect by saying: ‘if the benefit excludes the person harmed this too is nowadays regarded by many people as morally unacceptable’ (Walker 1980, p. 65). However, as the context clearly shows, by ‘the person harmed’ he means the person punished. He does not mention the initial harm suffered by victims. This problem is concerned with my previous claim; that is, we have to consider the ‘whom-question’ when we discuss the justification of punishment. Whom are we discussing? Whose benefit do we consider? In the face of victims before our eyes, can we emphasise only the improvement of preventive systems for the future? Evidently, actual victims are the first to be helped, although obviously it is not at all bad to simultaneously consider the preventive system in the future. It is necessary for us to respect basic human rights and the human dignity of perpetrators and innocent people in the future; however, that respect must be in conjunction with our first taking care of actual victims. We ought not to get our priorities wrong.

10. Prospects

I have indicated that the debates on the death penalty are inevitably surrounded by four problems over specific kinds of uncertainties: uncertainty concerning the victim of homicide, uncertainty in justifying the death penalty from the feeling of being victimised, uncertainty in justifying the death penalty on the basis of human rights, and uncertainty over negative causation. In the course of examining these problems, I have proposed the option of developing an ‘impossibilist’ position about the death penalty, which I am convinced, deserves further investigation. However, being surrounded by theoretical problems and uncertainties might be more or less true of any social institution. My aim is only to suggest how the death penalty should be understood as involving uncertainties from a philosophical perspective. Most likely, if there is something practical that I can suggest based on my argument, then what we might call a ‘Harm-Centred System’ may be introduced as a relatively promising option instead of, or in tandem with, the death penalty. What I mean by this is a system in which we establish as a priority redressing actual harm with regard to legal justice, where ‘actual harm’ only implies what the bereaved family suffer from, as the direct victims have already disappeared in the case of homicide. In other words, I think that something akin to the maximalist approach to restorative justice 10 or some hybrid of the traditional justice system and the restorative justice system should be seriously considered, although we cannot expect perfect solutions exempt from all of the above four problems. It is certainly worth considering whether some element of restorative justice can play a significant role in the best theory of punishment.

In any case, my argument is at most a philosophical attempt to address problems. How to apply it to the practice of the legal system is a question to be tackled in a future project.

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Menzies, P. 2004. ‘Difference-Making in Context’. In J. Collins, N. Hall, and L. A. Paul, Causation and Counterfactuals . MIT Press, 139–180.

Pojman, L. P., and J. Reiman. 1998. The Death Penalty: For and Against. Rowman &Littlefield Publishers, Inc.

Scanlon, T. M. 1982. ‘Contractualism and utilitarianism’. In A. Sen and B. Williams, Utilitarianism and Beyond . Cambridge University Press, 103-128.,

Simmons, A. J. 1994. ‘Locke on the Death Penalty’. Philosophy 69:270, 471–477.

Strawson, G. 2008. ‘The Impossibility of Ultimate Moral Responsibility’. In Real Materialism. Oxford University Press, 319–331.

Tonry, M. 1994. ‘Proportionality, Parsimony, and Interchangeability of Punishments’. In A Reader on Punishment , eds. A. Duff and D. Garland. Oxford University Press, 133–160.

Van den Faag, E. 1995 (originally 1969). ‘On Deterrence and the Death Penalty’. In Punishment and the Death Penalty: The Current Debate , eds. R. M. Baird and S. E. Rosenbaum. Prometheus Books.

Von Hirsch, A. 1993. Censure and Sanctions. Oxford University Press.

Walen, A, 2015. ‘Retributive Justice’. The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Summer 2015 Edition), Edward N. Zalta (ed.). Available from http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/sum2015/entries/justice-retributive/ [Accessed 12 June 2017]

Walker, N. 1980. Punishment, Danger and Stigma: The Morality of Criminal Justice . Barnes & Noble Books.

1. Strangely, few Locke scholars have seriously tried to understand the Lockean meaning of punishment, which is developed in his Second Treatise ,(Locke 1960), in the light of his theory of personal identity based upon ‘consciousness’, which is discussed in his Essay Concerning Human Understanding . Taking into account the fact that ‘person’ appears as the key word in both works of Locke, we must bridge the gap between his two works by rethinking the universal significance of ‘person’ in his arguments. There were, however, some controversies concerning how Locke evaluates the death penalty. See Calvert (1993) and Simmons (1994).

2. There is an additional question about whether justification is needed after the execution when the convict is no longer around, in addition to ‘before’ and ‘during’. According to my understanding of justification, the process of justification must begin with making each person concerned understand what there is no reason to reject, but that is just a starting, necessary point. Justification must go beyond the initial phase to acquiring general consent from society. In this sense, justification seems to be needed even ‘after’ the execution. Actually, if there is no need for justification after the execution, that sounds less like punishment based on a system of justice than merely physical disposal.

3. Is it true that the death penalty is the ultimate punishment? Can we not suppose that the death penalty is less harmful than a life sentence or very lengthy incarceration? However, this view regarding the death penalty as less harmful than a lifelong sentence could lead to a paradox. If this order of severity as punishment is valid, it may be possible to reduce the lifelong sentence (due to an amnesty, some consideration on the prisoner’s rehabilitation, or something like that) to the death penalty. If this is the case, prisoners given the lifelong sentence will not make an effort at all to rehabilitate themselves, due to fear of the sentence being reduced to the death penalty. In addition, if a person is likely to be sentenced to death, the person might try to commit a more heinous crime, perhaps even in the court in order to be given a more severe sentence, i.e. a life sentence in prison. That is a paradox drawn from human nature.

4. On the current debates on ‘HTD’ of Epicurus, see Fischer (1993). Of course, there are lots of objections against the Epicurean view. The most typical objection is that death deprives people of their chance to enjoy life, and therefore death is harmful. However, it seems to me that “whom-question” must be raised again here. To whom is the deprivation of this chance harmful? In any case, the metaphysics of death is a popular topic in contemporary philosophy, which should involve not only metaphysical issues but also ethical and epistemological problems.

5. In fact, the hardships suffered by those forced to flee to shelters constituted the main problem resulting from the nuclear power plants accident. In general, radiation exposure is the most well-known problemarising from nuclear power plant accidents, but it is not always the case. In particular in the case of the Fukushima nuclear power plant accident in Japan, the overestimation of the danger of radiation exposure, and evacuation activities resulting from that overestimation, caused the biggest and the most serious problems including many of the deaths. We always have to take the risk-tradeoff into account. Radiation exposure is just one risk, and is not the only risk to be considered. See Ichinose (2016).

6. The notion of parsimony was newly offered to avoid a fundamental drawback of the standard retributive system, whether based on cardinal or ordinal proportionality: the standard system tends to inflict excessive, cruel punishment, as its criterion of measuring wrongness is not exempt from being arbitrary. In contrast, the newly offered system could hold inflicted punishment ‘as minimally as possible, consistent with the vague limits of cardinal desert’ (Walen 2015) in terms of introducing an idea of parsimony. The notion of parsimony could make the retributive system of punishment more reasonable and humane while retaining the idea of retribution.

7. Roger Crisp kindly pointed out that it is worth considering an institutional justification according to which punishment wouldn’t have to be tailored to a particular case. In this view, it is sufficient that death is generally bad for both victims and perpetrators. I do not deny the practical persuasiveness of this view. However, from a more philosophical point of view, we should propose a question ‘how can we know that death is generally bad for victims of homicide?’ Following HTD, which is certainly one possible philosophical view, death is not bad at all, regardless of whether we talk about general issues or particular cases, as an agent to whom something is bad or not disappears by dying by definition. Of course, as long as we exclusively focus upon harm which the bereaved family or the society in general suffer, the institutional justification could make good sense, although in that case the issue of direct victims killed would remain untouched.

8. Additionally, my analogy with natural disasters, particularly the case of the 2011 quake, could be re-confirmed to be appropriate in the sense of presenting a similar kind of uncertainty to the case of the death penalty. The danger of constant exposure to low doses of radiation for long periods involves some uncertainty, as far as we now know. Fortunately, however, the dose of radiation to which the people of Fukushima were exposed as a result of the 2011 quake, internally and externally, was low enough for us to be certain, based upon past epidemiological research, that no health problems will arise in the future. Regarding radiation exposure, everything depends upon the level of dose. The smaller the dose, the less dangerous it is.

9. On negative causation and the possibility of common cause, see Ichinose (2013). In particular, my argument on negative causation concerning the death penalty rests on my argument of Ichinose (2013).

10. According to Bazemore and Walgrave, ‘restorative justice is every action that is primarily oriented towards doing justice by repairing the harm that has been caused by a crime (Bazemore and Walgrave 1999 (2), p.48). Restorative justice, that is to say, is a justice system that mainly aims at restoring or repairing the harm of offences rather than punishing offenders as the retributive justice system does. Initially, restorative justice has been carried out by holding ‘a face-to-face meeting between the parties with a stake in the particular offense’ (ibid.) like victim, offenders, or victimised communities. However, this type of justice system works only in a complementary way to the traditional system of retributive justice. Then, the maximalist approach to restorative justice was proposed, which seeks to develop ‘restorative justice as a fully-fledged alternative’(Bazemore and Walgrave 1999 (1). Introduction. P.8) to retributive justice. This approach ‘will need to include the use of coercion and a formalization of both procedures and the relationship between communities and society’ (ibid., p.9.)

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The Death Penalty Can Ensure ‘Justice Is Being Done’

A top Justice Department official says for many Americans the death penalty is a difficult issue on moral, religious and policy grounds. But as a legal issue, it is straightforward.

By Jeffrey A. Rosen

Mr. Rosen is the deputy attorney general.

This month, for the first time in 17 years , the United States resumed carrying out death sentences for federal crimes.

On July 14, Daniel Lewis Lee was executed for the 1996 murder of a family, including an 8-year-old girl, by suffocating and drowning them in the Illinois Bayou after robbing them to fund a white-supremacist organization. On July 16, Wesley Purkey was executed for the 1998 murder of a teenage girl, whom he kidnapped, raped, killed, dismembered and discarded in a septic pond. The next day, Dustin Honken was executed for five murders committed in 1993, including the execution-style shooting of two young girls, their mother, and two prospective witnesses against him in a federal prosecution for methamphetamine trafficking.

The death penalty is a difficult issue for many Americans on moral, religious and policy grounds. But as a legal issue, it is straightforward. The United States Constitution expressly contemplates “capital” crimes, and Congress has authorized the death penalty for serious federal offenses since President George Washington signed the Crimes Act of 1790. The American people have repeatedly ratified that decision, including through the Federal Death Penalty Act of 1994 signed by President Bill Clinton, the federal execution of Timothy McVeigh under President George W. Bush and the decision by President Barack Obama’s Justice Department to seek the death penalty against the Boston Marathon bomber and Dylann Roof .

The recent executions reflect that consensus, as the Justice Department has an obligation to carry out the law. The decision to seek the death penalty against Mr. Lee was made by Attorney General Janet Reno (who said she personally opposed the death penalty but was bound by the law) and reaffirmed by Deputy Attorney General Eric Holder.

Mr. Purkey was prosecuted during the George W. Bush administration, and his conviction and sentence were vigorously defended throughout the Obama administration. The judge who imposed the death sentence on Mr. Honken, Mark Bennett, said that while he generally opposed the death penalty, he would not lose any sleep over Mr. Honken’s execution.

In a New York Times Op-Ed essay published on July 17 , two of Mr. Lee’s lawyers criticized the execution of their client, which they contend was carried out in a “shameful rush.” That objection overlooks that Mr. Lee was sentenced more than 20 years ago, and his appeals and other permissible challenges failed, up to and including the day of his execution.

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The Death Penalty - your questions answered

Does the death penalty stop crime? Does it give victims justice? Is there a humane way to execute? Get your facts straight about the death penalty with Amnesty’s top 10 FAQs on capital punishment.

1. Why does Amnesty International oppose the death penalty?

The death penalty violates the most fundamental human right – the right to life. It is the ultimate cruel, inhuman and degrading punishment .

The death penalty is discriminatory. It is often used against the most vulnerable in society, including the poor, ethnic and religious minorities, and people with mental disabilities. Some governments use it to silence their opponents. Where justice systems are flawed and unfair trials rife, the risk of executing an innocent person is ever present.

When the death penalty is carried out, it is final. Mistakes that are made cannot be unmade. An innocent person may be released from prison for a crime they did not commit, but an execution can never be reversed .

2. Don’t victims of violent crime and their families have a right to justice?

They do. Those who have lost loved ones in terrible crimes have a right to see the person responsible held to account in a fair trial without recourse to the death penalty. In opposing the death penalty, we are not trying to minimize or condone crime. But as many families who have lost loved ones have said, the death penalty cannot genuinely relieve their suffering. It just extends that suffering to the family of the condemned person.

“Revenge is not the answer. The answer lies in reducing violence, not causing more death’ -Marie Deans, whose mother-in-law was murdered in 1972.

3. If you kill someone else, don’t you deserve to die, too – “an eye for an eye”?

No. Executing someone because they’ve taken someone’s life is revenge, not justice.

An execution – or the threat of one –inflicts terrible physical and psychological cruelty. Any society which executes offenders is committing the same violence it condemns .

4. Doesn’t the death penalty prevent crime?

Not according to the research. There is no credible evidence that the death penalty deters crime more effectively than a prison term. In fact, crime figures from countries which have banned the death penalty have not risen. In some cases they have actually gone down . In Canada, the murder rate in 2008 was less than half that in 1976 when the death penalty was abolished there.

5. What about capital punishment for terrorists?

Governments often resort to the death penalty in the aftermath of violent attacks, to demonstrate they are doing something to “protect” national security. But the threat of execution is unlikely to stop men and women prepared to die for their beliefs – for example, suicide bombers. Executions are just as likely to create martyrs whose memory becomes a rallying point for their organizations.

People accused of “terrorism” are especially likely to be sentenced to death after unfair trials . Many are condemned on the basis of “confessions” extracted through torture . In some cases, special or military courts set up through counter-terrorism laws have sentenced civilians to death, undermining international standards.

‘The death penalty is a cheap way for politically inclined people to pretend to their fearful constituencies that something is being done to combat crime.” Jan van Rooyen, South African law professor

6. Isn’t it better to execute someone than to lock them up forever?

Every day, men, women, even children, await execution on death row. Whatever their crime, whether they are guilty or innocent, their lives are claimed by a system of justice that values retribution over rehabilitation. As long as a prisoner remains alive, he or she can hope for rehabilitation, or to be exonerated if they are later found to be innocent .

7. Is there a humane and painless way to execute a person?

Any form of execution is inhumane. The lethal injection is often touted as somehow more humane because, on the surface at least, it appears less grotesque and barbaric than other forms of execution such as beheading, electrocution, gassing and hanging.

But the search for a “humane” way to kill people should be seen for what it really is – an attempt to make executions more palatable to the public in whose name they are being carried out, and to make the governments that execute appear less like killers themselves.

8. What business is it of Amnesty’s if different societies want to use the death penalty?

Human rights – including the most basic right to life – are universal and endorsed by the vast majority of countries in the world. Our call to end the death penalty is consistent with the mercy, compassion and forgiveness that all major world religions emphasize. To date, 140 countries have abolished the death penalty in law or in practice, demonstrating that the desire to end capital punishment is shared by cultures and societies in almost every region in the world.

9. What if public opinion is in favour of the death penalty?

Strong public support for the death penalty often goes hand in hand with a lack of reliable information about it – most often the mistaken belief that it will reduce crime. Many governments are quick to promote this erroneous belief even though there is no evidence to support it. Crucial factors that underlie how the death penalty is applied are often not understood. These include the risk of executing an innocent person, the unfairness of trials, and the discriminatory nature of the death penalty – all of which contribute to a fully informed view of capital punishment.

We believe governments need to be open about this information, while promoting respect for human rights through public education programmes. Only then can there be meaningful debate on the death penalty.

Still the decision to execute someone cannot be decided by public opinion. Governments must lead the way.

10. Is the battle to abolish the death penalty being won?

Yes. Global executions fell by almost one-third last year to the lowest figure in at least a decade.

Following a change to its anti-narcotics laws, executions in Iran – a country where the use of the death penalty is rife – fell by a staggering 50%. Iraq, Pakistan and Somalia also showed a significant reduction in the number they carried out. As a result, execution figures fell globally from at least 993 in 2017, to at least 690 in 2018.

The statistics, from Amnesty’s 2018 global review of the death penalty , (PDF, 6MB) assess known executions worldwide except in China, where figures thought to be in their thousands remain classified as a state secret.

Learn more about Amnesty International Australia’s campaigns to end the death penalty and how you can help save lives today.

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5 Death Penalty Essays Everyone Should Know

Capital punishment is an ancient practice. It’s one that human rights defenders strongly oppose and consider as inhumane and cruel. In 2019, Amnesty International reported the lowest number of executions in about a decade. Most executions occurred in China, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Iraq, and Egypt . The United States is the only developed western country still using capital punishment. What does this say about the US? Here are five essays about the death penalty everyone should read:

“When We Kill”

By: Nicholas Kristof | From: The New York Times 2019

In this excellent essay, Pulitizer-winner Nicholas Kristof explains how he first became interested in the death penalty. He failed to write about a man on death row in Texas. The man, Cameron Todd Willingham, was executed in 2004. Later evidence showed that the crime he supposedly committed – lighting his house on fire and killing his three kids – was more likely an accident. In “When We Kill,” Kristof puts preconceived notions about the death penalty under the microscope. These include opinions such as only guilty people are executed, that those guilty people “deserve” to die, and the death penalty deters crime and saves money. Based on his investigations, Kristof concludes that they are all wrong.

Nicholas Kristof has been a Times columnist since 2001. He’s the winner of two Pulitizer Prices for his coverage of China and the Darfur genocide.

“An Inhumane Way of Death”

By: Willie Jasper Darden, Jr.

Willie Jasper Darden, Jr. was on death row for 14 years. In his essay, he opens with the line, “Ironically, there is probably more hope on death row than would be found in most other places.” He states that everyone is capable of murder, questioning if people who support capital punishment are just as guilty as the people they execute. Darden goes on to say that if every murderer was executed, there would be 20,000 killed per day. Instead, a person is put on death row for something like flawed wording in an appeal. Darden feels like he was picked at random, like someone who gets a terminal illness. This essay is important to read as it gives readers a deeper, more personal insight into death row.

Willie Jasper Darden, Jr. was sentenced to death in 1974 for murder. During his time on death row, he advocated for his innocence and pointed out problems with his trial, such as the jury pool that excluded black people. Despite worldwide support for Darden from public figures like the Pope, Darden was executed in 1988.

“We Need To Talk About An Injustice”

By: Bryan Stevenson | From: TED 2012

This piece is a transcript of Bryan Stevenson’s 2012 TED talk, but we feel it’s important to include because of Stevenson’s contributions to criminal justice. In the talk, Stevenson discusses the death penalty at several points. He points out that for years, we’ve been taught to ask the question, “Do people deserve to die for their crimes?” Stevenson brings up another question we should ask: “Do we deserve to kill?” He also describes the American death penalty system as defined by “error.” Somehow, society has been able to disconnect itself from this problem even as minorities are disproportionately executed in a country with a history of slavery.

Bryan Stevenson is a lawyer, founder of the Equal Justice Initiative, and author. He’s argued in courts, including the Supreme Court, on behalf of the poor, minorities, and children. A film based on his book Just Mercy was released in 2019 starring Michael B. Jordan and Jamie Foxx.

“I Know What It’s Like To Carry Out Executions”

By: S. Frank Thompson | From: The Atlantic 2019

In the death penalty debate, we often hear from the family of the victims and sometimes from those on death row. What about those responsible for facilitating an execution? In this opinion piece, a former superintendent from the Oregon State Penitentiary outlines his background. He carried out the only two executions in Oregon in the past 55 years, describing it as having a “profound and traumatic effect” on him. In his decades working as a correctional officer, he concluded that the death penalty is not working . The United States should not enact federal capital punishment.

Frank Thompson served as the superintendent of OSP from 1994-1998. Before that, he served in the military and law enforcement. When he first started at OSP, he supported the death penalty. He changed his mind when he observed the protocols firsthand and then had to conduct an execution.

“There Is No Such Thing As Closure on Death Row”

By: Paul Brown | From: The Marshall Project 2019

This essay is from Paul Brown, a death row inmate in Raleigh, North Carolina. He recalls the moment of his sentencing in a cold courtroom in August. The prosecutor used the term “closure” when justifying a death sentence. Who is this closure for? Brown theorizes that the prosecutors are getting closure as they end another case, but even then, the cases are just a way to further their careers. Is it for victims’ families? Brown is doubtful, as the death sentence is pursued even when the families don’t support it. There is no closure for Brown or his family as they wait for his execution. Vivid and deeply-personal, this essay is a must-read for anyone who wonders what it’s like inside the mind of a death row inmate.

Paul Brown has been on death row since 2000 for a double murder. He is a contributing writer to Prison Writers and shares essays on topics such as his childhood, his life as a prisoner, and more.

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About the author, emmaline soken-huberty.

Emmaline Soken-Huberty is a freelance writer based in Portland, Oregon. She started to become interested in human rights while attending college, eventually getting a concentration in human rights and humanitarianism. LGBTQ+ rights, women’s rights, and climate change are of special concern to her. In her spare time, she can be found reading or enjoying Oregon’s natural beauty with her husband and dog.

The Death Penalty Debate: Arguments For and Against Capital Punishment

The debate around the Death Penalty has been argued many times over, with the practice continuing to divide opinion. Many nations continue to impose the death penalty on criminals, while other nations have outlawed the punishment.

Several organisations also exist that attempt to fight against the death penalty. We now take a look at both sides of the argument.

We also have a viewer poll below, to gauge the opinion of our great readers! We would love you to take part below.

There are many different ways that the death penalty may be carried out. Hanging, firing squad and lethal injection are the most common, though it differs from territory to territory.

Offences that merit a death sentence typically include crimes against humanity, murder or espionage – again, the precise crimes that justify capital punishment will be different from nation to nation.

At the time of writing, 56 countries continue to legalise capital punishment. Notable countries include China, Iran, Saudi Arabia, the United States, Somalia and Afghanistan. Over 60% of the world’s population live in countries where the death penalty is a form of punishment. The topic has proven highly controversial.

Arguments For the Death Penalty

There are several arguments that support the use of capital punishment:

Arguments Against the Death Penalty

The takeaway.

As seen, the death penalty is a highly-controversial practice, and one that has many arguments both for and against its use. It will continue to be something that is scrutinised for many years to come.

Do you support the Death Penalty?

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Death Penalty - Essay Samples And Topic Ideas For Free

The death penalty, also known as capital punishment, remains a contentious issue in many societies. Essays on this topic could explore the moral, legal, and social arguments surrounding the practice, including discussions on retribution, deterrence, and justice. They might delve into historical trends in the application of the death penalty, the potential for judicial error, and the disparities in its application across different demographic groups. Discussions might also explore the psychological impact on inmates, the families involved, and the society at large. They could also analyze the global trends toward abolition or retention of the death penalty and the factors influencing these trends. A substantial compilation of free essay instances related to Death Penalty you can find at Papersowl. You can use our samples for inspiration to write your own essay, research paper, or just to explore a new topic for yourself.

Death Penalty and Justice

By now, many of us are familiar with the statement, "an eye for an eye," which came from the bible, so it should be followed as holy writ. Then there was Gandhi, who inspired thousands and said, "an eye for an eye will leave us all blind." This begs the question, which option do we pick to be a good moral agent, in the terms of justice that is. Some states in America practice the death penalty, where some states […]

The Controversy of Death Penalty

The death penalty is a very controversial topic in many states. Although the idea of the death penalty does sound terrifying, would you really want a murderer to be given food and shelter for free? Would you want a murderer to get out of jail and still end up killing another innocent person? Imagine if that murder gets out of jail and kills someone in your family; Wouldn’t you want that murderer to be killed as well? Murderers can kill […]

Stephen Nathanson’s “An Eye for an Eye”

According to Stephen Nathanson's "An Eye for an Eye?", he believes that capital punishment should be immediately abolished and that the principle of punishment, "lex talionis" which correlates to the classic saying "an eye for an eye" is not a valid reason for issuing the death penalty in any country, thus, abolishment of Capital Punishment should follow. Throughout the excerpt from his book, Nathanson argues against this principle believing that one, it forces us to "commit highly immoral actions”raping a […]

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Does the Death Penalty Effectively Deter Crime?

The death penalty in America has been effective since 1608. Throughout the years following the first execution, criminal behaviors have begun to deteriorate. Capital punishment was first formed to deter crime and treason. As a result, it increased the rate of crime, according to researchers. Punishing criminals by death does not effectively deter crime because criminals are not concerned with consequences, apprehension, and judges are not willing to pay the expenses. During the stage of mens rea, thoughts of committing […]

The Death Penalty: Right or Wrong?

The death penalty has been a controversial topic throughout the years and now more than ever, as we argue; Right or Wrong? Moral or Immoral? Constitutional or Unconstitutional? The death penalty also known as capital punishment is a legal process where the state justice sentences an individual to be executed as punishment for a crime committed. The death penalty sentence strongly depends on the severity of the crime, in the US there are 41 crimes that can lead to being […]

About Carlton Franklin

In most other situations, the long-unsolved Westfield Murder would have been a death penalty case. A 57-year-old legal secretary, Lena Triano, was found tied up, raped, beaten, and stabbed in her New Jersey home. A DNA sample from her undergarments connected Carlton Franklin to the scene of the crime. However, fortunately enough for Franklin, he was not convicted until almost four decades after the murder and, in an unusual turn of events, was tried in juvenile court. Franklin was fifteen […]

About the Death Penalty

The death penalty has been a method used as far back as the Eighteenth century B.C. The use of the death penalty was for punishing people for committing relentless crimes. The severity of the punishment were much more inferior in comparison to modern day. These inferior punishments included boiling live bodies, burning at the stake, hanging, and extensive use of the guillotine to decapitate criminals. In the ancient days no laws were established to dictate and regulate the type of […]

The Death Penalty should not be Legal

Imagine you hit your sibling and your mom hits you back to teach that you shouldn't be hitting anyone. Do you really learn not to be violent from that or instead do you learn how it is okay for moms or dads to hit their children in order to teach them something? This is exactly how the death penalty works. The death penalty has been a form of punishment for decades. There are several methods of execution and those are […]

Effectively Solving Society’s Criminality

Has one ever wondered if the person standing or sitting next to them has the potential to be a murderer or a rapist? What do those who are victimized personally or have suffered from a tragic event involving a loved-one or someone near and dear to their heart, expect from the government? Convicted felons of this nature and degree of unlawfulness should be sentenced to death. Psychotic killers and rapists need the ultimate consequences such as the death penalty for […]

Religious Values and Death Penalty

Religious and moral values tell us that killing is wrong. Thou shall not kill. To me, the death penalty is inhumane. Killing people makes us like the murderers that most of us despise. No imperfect system should have the right to decide who lives and who dies. The government is made up of imperfect humans, who make mistakes. The only person that should be able to take life, is god. "An eye for an eye leaves the whole world blind". […]

Abolishment of the Death Penalty

Abstract: The purpose of this paper is to relate many different criminological theories in regard to capital punishment. We relate many criminological theories such as; cognitive theory, deviant place theory, latent trait theory, differential association theory, behavioral theory, attachment theory, lifestyle theory, and biosocial theory. This paper empirically analyzes the idea that capital punishment is inhumane and should be abolished. We analyze this by taking into consideration false convictions, deterrence of crime, attitudes towards capital punishment, mental illness and juvenile […]

Punishment and the Nature of the Crime

When an individual commits a crime then he/she is given punishment depending on the nature of the crime committed. The US's way of giving punishment to an offender has been criticized for many years. There are 2 types of cases; civil and criminal cases. In civil cases, most of the verdict comprises of jail time or fine amount to be paid. These are not as severe except the one related to money laundering and forgery. On the other hand, criminal […]

The Death Penalty and Juveniles

Introduction: In today's society, many juveniles are being sent to trial without having the chance of getting a fair trial as anyone else would. Many citizens would see juveniles as dangerous individuals, but in my opinion how a teenager acts at home starts at home. Punishing a child for something that could have been solved at home is something that should not have to get worse by giving them the death penalty. The death penalty should not be imposed on […]

Is the Death Penalty “Humane”

What’s the first thing that pops up in your mind when you hear the words Capital Punishment? I’m assuming for most people the first thing that pops up is a criminal sitting on a chair, with all limbs tied down, and some type of mechanism connected to their head. Even though this really isn't the way that it is done, I do not blame people for imagining that type of image because that is how movies usually portray capital punishment. […]

Euthanasia and Death Penalty

Euthanasia and death penalty are two controversy topics, that get a lot of attention in today's life. The subject itself has the roots deep in the beginning of the humankind. It is interesting and maybe useful to learn the answer and if there is right or wrong in those actions. The decision if a person should live or die depends on the state laws. There are both opponents and supporters of the subject. However different the opinions are, the state […]

The Death Penalty is not Worth the Cost

The death penalty is a government practice, used as a punishment for capital crimes such as treason, murder, and genocide to name a few. It has been a controversial topic for many years some countries still use it while others don't. In the United States, each state gets to choose whether they consider it to be legal or not. Which is why in this country 30 states allow it while 20 states have gotten rid of it. It is controversial […]

Ineffectiveness of Death Penalty

Death penalty as a means of punishing crime and discouraging wrong behaviour has suffered opposition from various fronts. Religious leaders argue that it is morally wrong to take someone's life while liberal thinkers claim that there are better ways to punish wrong behaviour other than the death penalty. This debate rages on while statistically, Texas executes more individuals than any other state in the United States of America. America itself also has the highest number of death penalty related deaths […]

Is the Death Penalty Morally Right?

There have been several disputes on whether the death penalty is morally right. Considering the ethical issues with this punishment can help distinguish if it should be denied or accepted. For example, it can be argued that a criminal of extreme offenses should be granted the same level of penance as their crime. During the duration of their sentencing they could repent on their actions and desire another opportunity of freedom. The death penalty should be outlawed because of too […]

Why the Death Penalty is Unjust

Capital punishment being either a justifiable law, or a horrendous, unjust act can be determined based on the perspective of different worldviews. In a traditional Christian perspective, the word of God given to the world in The Holy Bible should only be abided by. The Holy Bible states that no man (or woman) should shed the blood of another man (or woman). Christians are taught to teach a greater amount of sacrifice for the sake of the Lord. Social justice […]

The Death Penalty and People’s Opinions

The death penalty is a highly debated topic that often divided opinion amongst people all around the world. Firstly, let's take a look at our capital punishments, with certain crimes, come different serving times. Most crimes include treason, espionage, murder, large-scale drug trafficking, and murder towards a juror, witness, or a court officer in some cases. These are a few examples compared to the forty-one federal capital offenses to date. When it comes to the death penalty, there are certain […]

The Debate of the Death Penalty

Capital punishment is a moral issue that is often scrutinized due to the taking of someone’s life. This is in large part because of the views many have toward the rule of law or an acceptance to the status quo. In order to get a true scope of the death penalty, it is best to address potential biases from a particular ethical viewpoint. By looking at it from several theories of punishment, selecting the most viable theory makes it a […]

The History of the Death Penalty

The History of the death penalty goes as far back as ancient China and Babylon. However, the first recorded death sentence took place in 16th Century BC Egypt, where executions were carried out with an ax. Since the very beginning, people were treated according to their social status; those wealthy were rarely facing brutal executions; on the contrary, most of the population was facing cruel executions. For instance, in the 5th Century BC, the Roman Law of the Twelve Tablets […]

Death Penalty is Immoral

Let's say your child grabs a plate purposely. You see them grab the plate, smash it on the ground and look you straight in the eyes. Are they deserving of a punishment? Now what if I say your child is three years old. A three year old typically doesn't know they have done something wrong. But since your child broke that one plate, your kid is being put on death row. You may be thinking, that is too harsh of […]

The Death Penalty in the United States

The United States is the "land of the free, home of the brave" and the death penalty (American National Anthem). Globally, America stands number five in carrying executions (Lockie). Since its resurrection in 1976, the year in which the Supreme Court reestablished the constitutionality of the death penalty, more than 1,264 people have been executed, predominantly by the medium of lethal injection (The Guardian). Almost all death penalty cases entangle the execution of assassins; although, they may also be applied […]

Cost of the Death Penalty

The death penalty costs more than life in prison. According to Fox News correspondent Dan Springer, the State of California spent 4 billion dollars to execute 13 individuals, in addition to the net spend of an estimated $64,000 per prisoner every year. Springer (2011) documents how the death penalty convictions declined due to economic reasons. The state spends up to 3 times more when seeking a death penalty than when pursuing a life in prison without the possibility of parole. […]

The Solution to the Death Penalty

There has never been a time when the United States of America was free from criminals indulging in killing, stealing, exploiting people, and even selling illegal items. Naturally, America refuses to tolerate the crimes committed by those who view themselves as above the law. Once these convicts are apprehended, they are brought to justice. In the past, these criminals often faced an ultimate punishment: the death penalty. Mercy was a foreign concept due to their underdeveloped understanding of the value […]

Costs: Death Penalty Versus Prison Costs

The Conservatives Concerned Organization challenges the notion that the death penalty is more cost effective compared to prison housing and feeding costs. The organization argues that the death penalty is an expensive lengthy and complicated process concluding that it is not only a bloated program that delays justice and bogs down the enforcement of the law, it is also an inefficient justice process that diverts financial resources from law enforcement programs that could protect individuals and save lives. According to […]

Death Penalty as a Source of Constant Controversy

The death penalty has been a source of almost constant controversy for hundreds of years, splitting the population down the middle with people supporting the death penalty and people that think it is unnecessary. The amount of people that are been against the death penalty has grown in recent years, causing the amount of executions to dwindle down to where there is less than one hundred every year. This number will continue to lessen as more and more people decide […]

Death Penalty is Politically Just?

Being wrongfully accused is unimaginable, but think if you were wrongfully accused and the ultimate punishment was death. Death penalty is one of the most controversial issues in today's society, but what is politically just? When a crime is committed most assume that the only acceptable consequence is to be put to death rather than thinking of another form of punishment. Religiously the death penalty is unfair because the, "USCCB concludes prisoners can change and find redemption through ministry outreach, […]

George Walker Bush and Death Penalty

George Walker Bush, a former U.S. president, and governor of Texas, once spoke, "I don't think you should support the death penalty to seek revenge. I don't think that's right. I think the reason to support the death penalty is because it saves other people's lives." The death penalty, or capital punishment, refers to the execution of a criminal convicted of a capital offense. With many criminals awaiting execution on death row, the death penalty has been a debated topic […]

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How To Write an Essay About Death Penalty

Understanding the topic.

When writing an essay about the death penalty, the first step is to understand the depth and complexities of the topic. The death penalty, also known as capital punishment, is a legal process where a person is put to death by the state as a punishment for a crime. This topic is highly controversial and evokes strong emotions on both sides of the debate. It's crucial to approach this subject with sensitivity and a balanced perspective, acknowledging the moral, legal, and ethical considerations involved. Research is key in this initial phase, as it's important to gather facts, statistics, and viewpoints from various sources to have a well-rounded understanding of the topic. This foundation will set the tone for your essay, guiding your argument and supporting your thesis.

Structuring the Argument

The next step is structuring your argument. In an essay about the death penalty, it's vital to present a clear thesis statement that outlines your stance on the issue. Are you for or against it? What are the reasons behind your position? The body of your essay should then systematically support your thesis through well-structured arguments. Each paragraph should focus on a specific aspect of the death penalty, such as its ethical implications, its effectiveness as a deterrent to crime, or the risk of wrongful convictions. Ensure that each point is backed up by evidence and examples, and remember to address counterarguments. This not only shows that you have considered multiple viewpoints but also strengthens your position by demonstrating why these opposing arguments may be less valid.

Exploring Ethical and Moral Dimensions

An essential aspect of writing an essay on the death penalty is exploring its ethical and moral dimensions. This involves delving into philosophical debates about the value of human life, justice, and retribution. It's important to discuss the moral justifications that are often used to defend the death penalty, such as the idea of 'an eye for an eye,' and to critically evaluate these arguments. Equally important is exploring the ethical arguments against the death penalty, including the potential for innocent people to be executed and the question of whether the state should have the power to take a life. This section of the essay should challenge readers to think deeply about their values and the principles of a just society.

Concluding Thoughts

In conclusion, revisit your thesis and summarize the key points made in your essay. This is your final opportunity to reinforce your argument and leave a lasting impression on your readers. Discuss the broader implications of the death penalty in society and consider potential future developments in this area. You might also want to offer recommendations or pose questions that encourage further reflection on the topic. Remember, a strong conclusion doesn't just restate what has been said; it provides closure and offers new insights, prompting readers to continue thinking about the subject long after they have finished reading your essay.

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Essay: Arguments against the Death Penalty

Essay: Arguments against the Death…

The idea of putting another human to death is hard to completely fathom. The physical mechanics involved in the act of execution are easy to grasp, but the emotions involved in carrying out a death sentence on another person, regardless of how much they deserve it, is beyond my own understanding. However, this act is sometimes necessary and it is our responsibility as a society to see that it is done. Opponents of capital punishment have basically four arguments.

The first is that there is a possibility of error. However, the chance that there might be an error is separate from the issue of whether the death penalty can be justified or not. If an error does occur, and an innocent person is executed, then the problem lies in the court system, not in the death penalty.

Furthermore, most activities in our world, in which humans are involved, possess a possibility of injury or death. Construction, sports, driving, and air travel all offer the possibility of accidental death even though the highest levels of precautions are taken.

These activities continue to take place and continue to occasionally take human lives, because we have all decided, as a society, that the advantages outweigh the unintended loss. We have also decided that the advantages of having dangerous murderers removed from our society outweigh the losses of the offender.

The second argument against capital punishment is that it is unfair in its administration. Statistics show that the poor and minorities are more likely to receive the death penalty. Once again, this is a separate issue.

It can’t be disputed sadly, the rich are more likely to get off with a lesser sentence, and this bias is wrong. However, this is yet another problem with our current court system. The racial and economic bias is not a valid argument against the death penalty. It is an argument against the courts and their unfair system of sentencing.

The third argument is actually a rebuttal to a claim made by some supporters of the death penalty. The claim is that the threat of capital punishment reduces violent crimes. Opponents of the death penalty do not agree and have a valid argument when they say, “The claims that capital punishment reduces violent crime is inconclusive and certainly not proven.”

The fourth argument is that the length of stay on death row, with its endless appeals, delays, technicalities, and retrials, keep a person waiting for death for years on end. It is both cruel and costly. This is the least credible argument against capital punishment. The main cause of such inefficiencies is the appeals process, which allows capital cases to bounce back and forth between state and federal courts for years on end.

If supporting a death row inmate for the rest their life costs less than putting them to death, and ending their financial burden on society, then the problem lies in the court system, not in the death penalty. As for the additional argument, that making a prisoner wait for years to be executed is cruel, then would not waiting for death in prison for the rest of your life be just as cruel, as in the case of life imprisonment without parole.

Many Americans will tell you why they are in favor of the death penalty. It is what they deserve. It prevents them from ever murdering again. It removes the burden from taxpayers. We all live in a society with the same basic rights and guarantees. We have the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness with equal opportunities.

This is the basis of our society. It is the foundation on which everything else is built upon. When someone willfully and flagrantly attacks this foundation by murdering another, robbing them of all they are, and all they will ever be, then that person can no longer be a part of this society. The only method that completely separates cold blooded murderers from our society is the death penalty.

As the 20th century comes to a close, it is evident that our justice system is in need of reform. This reform will shape the future of our country, and we cannot jump to quick solutions such as the elimination of the death penalty. As of now, the majority of American supports the death penalty as an effective solution of punishment.

“An eye for an eye,” is what some Americans would say concerning the death penalty. Supporters of the death penalty ask the question, “Why should I, an honest hardworking taxpayer, have to pay to support a murderer for the rest of their natural life? Why not execute them and save society the cost of their keep?” Many Americans believe that the death penalty is wrong. However, it seems obvious to some Americans that the death penalty is a just and proper way to handle convicted murderers.

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10 Comments

The title is Arguments against the Death Penalty yet the author spent the whole time counterclaiming any arguments brought up rather than explaining the logistics behind the arguments. No side was taken in this essay however the title clearly states that the essay should be on arguments against.

Who is the Author?

I agree with y’all the death penalty is wrong because why make them die really quick when you can make them suffer for what they did?

I disagree entirely

I agree with you!

Are you Gonna pay for them to be alive then? We are wasting money that could be spent helping the homeless or retired vetrans.

more money is spent on actually executing prisoners ? so how that makes any sense i dont know?

Whatever henious crime one does,we are not uncivilised and barbaric to take the lives of others.If we ought to give them death sentence as punishment,then what distinguishes us from the criminals?Also I don’t think that giving death sentence would deter the other criminals from doing the same and reduce the number of crimes.If insecurity is the major issue behind demanding capital punishment,then the best solution is framing the punishment in such a way that the culprit would never be a threat to the society,not hanging to death.

what distinguishes us from murderers is that we ONLY kill when necessary, if for example there was a serial killer arrested a death penalty is necessary because 1. if said killer ever breaks out they could kill many more people, and 2. the government is already pouring enough money into the prisons right now. more people means more money needed. money that could go to our military or police.

now there is also (as said above) problems with the current situation in the courts, a rich man will get a great lawyer while a poor man gets the best they can afford, though the reasoning behind the long wait I do understand, it is to reduce the likelihood of an innocent man or woman from being put to death.

by the way we don’t hang people anymore we give them painless deaths

also, in response to your idea of a different punishment to stop a criminal from committing crime again do YOU have any ideas because if you do I please post them. I AM willing to have a actual debate if you are willing to calmly do so.

It’s been proven that it costs more to put a prisoner to death by death penalty than letting them sit in jail for the rest of their life. The death penalty is funded by the taxes we pay to the government. As a taxpayer, i don’t want to spend extra money that i make to put a murdered etc. to death when they could sit in jail for the rest of their life and this is just as much punishment for them. They have time to think about their actions and hopefully get their mind right, get some help, and get right with God or whatever faith they believe in if they do. Some cases may be acceptable for the death penalty, but it should be the absolute worse ones, or if the prisoner breaks out as stated before.

The pros and cons of the death penalty

Despite global progress towards abolition, public opinion remains divided as executions increase

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Anti-death penalty protests outside the US Supreme Court

Pro: public support

Con: wrongful execution risk, pro: could reduce crime, con: not a deterrent, pro: sense of retribution, con: extremely expensive.

The number of executions is rising around the world, even as many countries move towards abolishing or limiting the use of capital punishment.

According to the latest figures from Amnesty International – compiled from official statistics, media reports and information passed on from individuals sentenced to death – there were 883 executions worldwide in 2022. This total excludes China, which does not release details of those killed by the state but is believed to execute thousands of people a year. The global figure is up 53% from 2021 and is the highest number since 2017.

Amnesty said that at the end of 2022 there were more than 28,000 people under sentence of death in 52 countries.

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In the past half century capital punishment has increasingly been viewed as a human-rights issue. More than 120 countries have abolished the death penalty in law or in practice, according to The Death Penalty Project . Now, executions are most commonly carried out in China, Iran, Egypt and Saudi Arabia (although there is little reliable data for countries such as Afghanistan, North Korea and Syria).

Although use of the death penalty is gradually declining in the US, a 2021 survey by Gallup found a majority of Americans (54%) said they were "in favour of the death penalty for a person convicted of murder".

In France, which abolished death by guillotine only in 1981, presidential frontrunner Marine Le Pen has vowed to hold a referendum on restoring capital punishment, which is backed by a huge majority of her supporters .

A YouGov poll in 2022 found 40% of Britons were still in favour of the death penalty, with Conservative voters far more likely to support it (58%), and those aged over 65 more than twice as likely as those aged 18-24.

One of the most "compelling forces" driving worldwide opinions against the death penalty has been "the increasing recognition of the potential for error in its use", wrote criminology professor Carolyn Hoyle and Saul Lehrfreund, co-director of the London-based NGO The Death Penalty Project, in a blog for the University of Oxford’s Death Penalty Research Unit . With justice systems prone to error, bias and coercion, wrongful executions are, in fact, "inevitable".

Since 1993, Washington-based non-profit organisation The Death Penalty Information Center has been tracking wrongful executions in the US, going back to the Supreme Court ruling in 1972. In a 2021 report, "The Innocence Epidemic", it concluded that at least 185 people had been wrongfully convicted and sentenced to death since 1972. Nearly 70% of those cases involved "official misconduct by police, prosecutors or other government officials" – more so in cases involving a defendant of colour.

"The death penalty has always been, and continues to be, disproportionately wielded against black people and other people of colour," explained the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers , regarding the US. As of 2019, "black and Hispanic people represent 31% of the US population, but 53% of death-row inmates".

The "commonest justification" for the death penalty is that it functions as a "unique deterrent" for others, wrote Lehrfreund.

"Nobody has ever committed a crime after being executed," Lee Anderson, the former Tory party deputy chairman, told The Spectator last year, backing calls to bring back the death penalty in Britain. A subsequent poll by Omnisis found 43% of British respondents agreed capital punishment would be an effective deterrent.

"When the UK first suspended the death penalty in 1965, many hoped that removing violence from the top end of justice would trickle down through society, making us more civilised," wrote Tim Stanley in The Telegraph . "Instead, crime went up, and today, as predators exploit our liberality, a state without the death penalty resembles a lion tamer without a whip."

The death penalty has "no deterrent effect", said the American Civil Liberties Union . "Claims that each execution deters a certain number of murders have been thoroughly discredited by social science research."

Most murders are committed either in the heat of passion, under the influence of alcohol or drugs, or because of mental illness. The few murderers who plan their crimes "intend and expect to avoid punishment altogether by not getting caught".

The Death Penalty Project concluded after a review of multiple studies that capital punishment "does not deter murder to a marginally greater extent than does the threat or application of life imprisonment". In 2021, the Human Rights Council cited studies which showed that some member states that had abolished the death penalty saw their murder rates stay the same, or even decline.

Of the "four major justifications for punishment" – deterrence, rehabilitation, incapacitation and retribution – it is the last of these that has "often been scorned by academics and judges", said Robert Blecker, a professor emeritus at New York Law School, in The New York Times . But "ultimately, it provides capital punishment with its only truly moral foundation".

Supporters often point to religious justification based on the Bible, citing "an eye for an eye". But retribution is "not simply revenge", said Blecker. "Revenge may be limitless and misdirected at the undeserving, as with collective punishment. Retribution, on the other hand, can help restore a moral balance. It demands that punishment must be limited and proportional."

Many supporters of the death penalty argue that it is more cost-effective than feeding and housing an inmate for the whole of a life-without-parole sentence . But in countries with arduous appeals processes and strong human-rights organisations, the death penalty is – counterintuitively – far more expensive than imprisonment for life.

More than a dozen US states found in 2007 that death penalty cases were up to 10 times more expensive than comparable non-death penalty cases. That year, New Jersey became the first state to ban executions for reasons of "time and money", said NBC News .

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Harriet Marsden is a writer for The Week, mostly covering UK and global news and politics. Before joining the site, she was a freelance journalist for seven years, specialising in social affairs, gender equality and culture. She worked for The Guardian, The Times and The Independent, and regularly contributed articles to The Sunday Times, The Telegraph, The New Statesman, Tortoise Media and Metro, as well as appearing on BBC Radio London, Times Radio and “Woman’s Hour”. She has a master’s in international journalism from City University, London, and was awarded the "journalist-at-large" fellowship by the Local Trust charity in 2021.

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Introduction
Historical considerations

Moral arguments

Utilitarian arguments, practical arguments, the abolition movement.

Capital punishment in the early 21st century

Arguments for and against capital punishment

Our editors will review what you’ve submitted and determine whether to revise the article.

Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy - Capital Punishment
Santa Clara University - Capital Punishment: Our Duty or Our Doom?
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capital punishment - Student Encyclopedia (Ages 11 and up)
Table Of Contents

Capital punishment has long engendered considerable debate about both its morality and its effect on criminal behaviour. Contemporary arguments for and against capital punishment fall under three general headings: moral , utilitarian, and practical.

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Supporters of the death penalty believe that those who commit murder , because they have taken the life of another, have forfeited their own right to life. Furthermore, they believe, capital punishment is a just form of retribution , expressing and reinforcing the moral indignation not only of the victim’s relatives but of law-abiding citizens in general. By contrast, opponents of capital punishment, following the writings of Cesare Beccaria (in particular On Crimes and Punishments [1764]), argue that, by legitimizing the very behaviour that the law seeks to repress—killing—capital punishment is counterproductive in the moral message it conveys. Moreover, they urge, when it is used for lesser crimes, capital punishment is immoral because it is wholly disproportionate to the harm done. Abolitionists also claim that capital punishment violates the condemned person’s right to life and is fundamentally inhuman and degrading.

Although death was prescribed for crimes in many sacred religious documents and historically was practiced widely with the support of religious hierarchies , today there is no agreement among religious faiths, or among denominations or sects within them, on the morality of capital punishment. Beginning in the last half of the 20th century, increasing numbers of religious leaders—particularly within Judaism and Roman Catholicism—campaigned against it. Capital punishment was abolished by the state of Israel for all offenses except treason and crimes against humanity, and Pope John Paul II condemned it as “cruel and unnecessary.”

Supporters of capital punishment also claim that it has a uniquely potent deterrent effect on potentially violent offenders for whom the threat of imprisonment is not a sufficient restraint. Opponents, however, point to research that generally has demonstrated that the death penalty is not a more effective deterrent than the alternative sanction of life or long-term imprisonment.

There also are disputes about whether capital punishment can be administered in a manner consistent with justice . Those who support capital punishment believe that it is possible to fashion laws and procedures that ensure that only those who are really deserving of death are executed. By contrast, opponents maintain that the historical application of capital punishment shows that any attempt to single out certain kinds of crime as deserving of death will inevitably be arbitrary and discriminatory. They also point to other factors that they think preclude the possibility that capital punishment can be fairly applied, arguing that the poor and ethnic and religious minorities often do not have access to good legal assistance, that racial prejudice motivates predominantly white juries in capital cases to convict black and other nonwhite defendants in disproportionate numbers, and that, because errors are inevitable even in a well-run criminal justice system, some people will be executed for crimes they did not commit. Finally, they argue that, because the appeals process for death sentences is protracted, those condemned to death are often cruelly forced to endure long periods of uncertainty about their fate.

Under the influence of the European Enlightenment , in the latter part of the 18th century there began a movement to limit the scope of capital punishment. Until that time a very wide range of offenses, including even common theft, were punishable by death—though the punishment was not always enforced , in part because juries tended to acquit defendants against the evidence in minor cases. In 1794 the U.S. state of Pennsylvania became the first jurisdiction to restrict the death penalty to first-degree murder, and in 1846 the state of Michigan abolished capital punishment for all murders and other common crimes. In 1863 Venezuela became the first country to abolish capital punishment for all crimes, including serious offenses against the state (e.g., treason and military offenses in time of war). San Marino was the first European country to abolish the death penalty, doing so in 1865; by the early 20th century several other countries, including the Netherlands, Norway , Sweden , Denmark , and Italy , had followed suit (though it was reintroduced in Italy under the fascist regime of Benito Mussolini ). By the mid-1960s some 25 countries had abolished the death penalty for murder, though only about half of them also had abolished it for offenses against the state or the military code. For example, Britain abolished capital punishment for murder in 1965, but treason, piracy, and military crimes remained capital offenses until 1998.

During the last third of the 20th century, the number of abolitionist countries increased more than threefold. These countries, together with those that are “de facto” abolitionist—i.e., those in which capital punishment is legal but not exercised—now represent more than half the countries of the world. One reason for the significant increase in the number of abolitionist states was that the abolition movement was successful in making capital punishment an international human rights issue, whereas formerly it had been regarded as solely an internal matter for the countries concerned.

In 1971 the United Nations General Assembly passed a resolution that, “in order fully to guarantee the right to life, provided for in…the Universal Declaration of Human Rights,” called for restricting the number of offenses for which the death penalty could be imposed, with a view toward abolishing it altogether. This resolution was reaffirmed by the General Assembly in 1977. Optional protocols to the European Convention on Human Rights (1983) and to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (1989) have been established, under which countries party to the convention and the covenant undertake not to carry out executions. The Council of Europe (1994) and the EU (1998) established as a condition of membership in their organizations the requirement that prospective member countries suspend executions and commit themselves to abolition. This decision had a remarkable impact on the countries of central and eastern Europe , prompting several of them—e.g., the Czech Republic , Hungary , Romania , Slovakia , and Slovenia—to abolish capital punishment.

In the 1990s many African countries—including Angola, Djibouti, Mozambique, and Namibia—abolished capital punishment, though most African countries retained it. In South Africa , which formerly had one of the world’s highest execution rates, capital punishment was outlawed in 1995 by the Constitutional Court, which declared that it was incompatible with the prohibition against cruel, inhuman, or degrading punishment and with “a human rights culture.”

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Most Americans Favor the Death Penalty Despite Concerns About Its Administration

78% say there is some risk of innocent people being put to death

Table of contents.

Acknowledgments
Methodology

Pew Research Center conducted this study to better understand Americans’ views about the death penalty. For this analysis, we surveyed 5,109 U.S. adults from April 5 to 11, 2021. Everyone who took part in this survey is a member of the Center’s American Trends Panel (ATP), an online survey panel that is recruited through national, random sampling of residential addresses. This way nearly all U.S. adults have a chance of selection. The survey is weighted to be representative of the U.S. adult population by gender, race, ethnicity, partisan affiliation, education and other categories. Read more about the ATP’s methodology .

Here are the questions used for the report, along with responses, and its methodology .

The use of the death penalty is gradually disappearing in the United States. Last year, in part because of the coronavirus outbreak, fewer people were executed than in any year in nearly three decades .

Chart shows majority of Americans favor death penalty, but nearly eight-in-ten see ‘some risk’ of executing the innocent

Yet the death penalty for people convicted of murder continues to draw support from a majority of Americans despite widespread doubts about its administration, fairness and whether it deters serious crimes.

More Americans favor than oppose the death penalty: 60% of U.S. adults favor the death penalty for people convicted of murder, including 27% who strongly favor it. About four-in-ten (39%) oppose the death penalty, with 15% strongly opposed, according to a new Pew Research Center survey.

The survey, conducted April 5-11 among 5,109 U.S. adults on the Center’s American Trends Panel, finds that support for the death penalty is 5 percentage points lower than it was in August 2020, when 65% said they favored the death penalty for people convicted of murder.

Chart shows since 2019, modest changes in views of the death penalty

While public support for the death penalty has changed only modestly in recent years, support for the death penalty declined substantially between the late 1990s and the 2010s. (See “Death penalty draws more Americans’ support online than in telephone surveys” for more on long-term measures and the challenge of comparing views across different survey modes.)

Large shares of Americans express concerns over how the death penalty is administered and are skeptical about whether it deters people from committing serious crimes.

Nearly eight-in-ten (78%) say there is some risk that an innocent person will be put to death, while only 21% think there are adequate safeguards in place to prevent that from happening. Only 30% of death penalty supporters – and just 6% of opponents – say adequate safeguards exist to prevent innocent people from being executed.

A majority of Americans (56%) say Black people are more likely than White people to be sentenced to the death penalty for being convicted of serious crimes. This view is particularly widespread among Black adults: 85% of Black adults say Black people are more likely than Whites to receive the death penalty for being convicted of similar crimes (61% of Hispanic adults and 49% of White adults say this).

Moreover, more than six-in-ten Americans (63%), including about half of death penalty supporters (48%), say the death penalty does not deter people from committing serious crimes.

Yet support for the death penalty is strongly associated with a belief that when someone commits murder, the death penalty is morally justified. Among the public overall, 64% say the death penalty is morally justified in cases of murder, while 33% say it is not justified. An overwhelming share of death penalty supporters (90%) say it is morally justified under such circumstances, compared with 25% of death penalty opponents.

Chart shows greater support for death penalty in online panel surveys than telephone surveys

The data in the most recent survey, collected from Pew Research Center’s online American Trends Panel (ATP) , finds that 60% of Americans favor the death penalty for persons convicted of murder. Over four ATP surveys conducted since September 2019, there have been relatively modest shifts in these views – from a low of 60% seen in the most recent survey to a high of 65% seen in September 2019 and August 2020.

In Pew Research Center phone surveys conducted between September 2019 and August 2020 (with field periods nearly identical to the online surveys), support for the death penalty was significantly lower: 55% favored the death penalty in September 2019, 53% in January 2020 and 52% in August 2020. The consistency of this difference points to substantial mode effects on this question. As a result, survey results from recent online surveys are not directly comparable with past years’ telephone survey trends. A post accompanying this report provides further detail and analysis of the mode differences seen on this question. And for more on mode effects and the transition from telephone surveys to online panel surveys, see “What our transition to online polling means for decades of phone survey trends” and “Trends are a cornerstone of public opinion research. How do we continue to track changes in public opinion when there’s a shift in survey mode?”

Partisanship continues to be a major factor in support for the death penalty and opinions about its administration. Just over three-quarters of Republicans and independents who lean toward the Republican Party (77%) say they favor the death penalty for persons convicted of murder, including 40% who strongly favor it.

Democrats and Democratic leaners are more divided on this issue: 46% favor the death penalty, while 53% are opposed. About a quarter of Democrats (23%) strongly oppose the death penalty, compared with 17% who strongly favor it.

Over the past two years, the share of Republicans who say they favor the death penalty for persons convicted of murder has decreased slightly – by 7 percentage points – while the share of Democrats who say this is essentially unchanged (46% today vs. 49% in 2019).

Chart shows partisan differences in views of the death penalty – especially on racial disparities in sentencing

Republicans and Democrats also differ over whether the death penalty is morally justified, whether it acts as a deterrent to serious crime and whether adequate safeguards exist to ensure that no innocent person is put to death. Republicans are 29 percentage points more likely than Democrats to say the death penalty is morally justified, 28 points more likely to say it deters serious crimes, and 19 points more likely to say that adequate safeguards exist.

But the widest partisan divide – wider than differences in opinions about the death penalty itself – is over whether White people and Black people are equally likely to be sentenced to the death penalty for committing similar crimes.

About seven-in-ten Republicans (72%) say that White people and Black people are equally likely to be sentenced to death for the same types of crimes. Only 15% of Democrats say this. More than eight-in-ten Democrats (83%) instead say that Black people are more likely than White people to be sentenced to the death penalty for committing similar crimes.

Differing views of death penalty by race and ethnicity, education, ideology

There are wide ideological differences within both parties on this issue. Among Democrats, a 55% majority of conservatives and moderates favor the death penalty, a position held by just 36% of liberal Democrats (64% of liberal Democrats oppose the death penalty). A third of liberal Democrats strongly oppose the death penalty, compared with just 14% of conservatives and moderates.

Chart shows ideological divides in views of the death penalty, particularly among Democrats

While conservative Republicans are more likely to express support for the death penalty than moderate and liberal Republicans, clear majorities of both groups favor the death penalty (82% of conservative Republicans and 68% of moderate and liberal Republicans).

As in the past, support for the death penalty differs across racial and ethnic groups. Majorities of White (63%), Asian (63%) and Hispanic adults (56%) favor the death penalty for persons convicted of murder. Black adults are evenly divided: 49% favor the death penalty, while an identical share oppose it.

Support for the death penalty also varies across age groups. About half of those ages 18 to 29 (51%) favor the death penalty, compared with about six-in-ten adults ages 30 to 49 (58%) and those 65 and older (60%). Adults ages 50 to 64 are most supportive of the death penalty, with 69% in favor.

There are differences in attitudes by education, as well. Nearly seven-in-ten adults (68%) who have not attended college favor the death penalty, as do 63% of those who have some college experience but no degree.

Chart shows non-college White, Black and Hispanic adults more supportive of death penalty

About half of those with four-year undergraduate degrees but no postgraduate experience (49%) support the death penalty. Among those with postgraduate degrees, a larger share say they oppose (55%) than favor (44%) the death penalty.

The divide in support for the death penalty between those with and without college degrees is seen across racial and ethnic groups, though the size of this gap varies. A large majority of White adults without college degrees (72%) favor the death penalty, compared with about half (47%) of White adults who have degrees. Among Black adults, 53% of those without college degrees favor the death penalty, compared with 34% of those with college degrees. And while a majority of Hispanic adults without college degrees (58%) say they favor the death penalty, a smaller share (47%) of those with college degrees say this.

Intraparty differences in support for the death penalty

Republicans are consistently more likely than Democrats to favor the death penalty, though there are divisions within each party by age as well as by race and ethnicity.

Republicans ages 18 to 34 are less likely than other Republicans to say they favor the death penalty. Just over six-in-ten Republicans in this age group (64%) say this, compared with about eight-in-ten Republicans ages 35 and older.

Chart shows partisan gap in views of death penalty is widest among adults 65 and older

Among Democrats, adults ages 50 to 64 are much more likely than adults in other age groups to favor the death penalty. A 58% majority of 50- to 64-year-old Democrats favor the death penalty, compared with 47% of those ages 35 to 49 and about four-in-ten Democrats who are 18 to 34 or 65 and older.

Overall, White adults are more likely to favor the death penalty than Black or Hispanic adults, while White and Asian American adults are equally likely to favor the death penalty. However, White Democrats are less likely to favor the death penalty than Black, Hispanic or Asian Democrats. About half of Hispanic (53%), Asian (53%) and Black (48%) Democrats favor the death penalty, compared with 42% of White Democrats.

About eight-in-ten White Republicans favor the death penalty, as do about seven-in-ten Hispanic Republicans (69%).

Differences by race and ethnicity, education over whether there are racial disparities in death penalty sentencing

There are substantial demographic differences in views of whether death sentencing is applied fairly across racial groups. While 85% of Black adults say Black people are more likely than White people to be sentenced to death for committing similar crimes, a narrower majority of Hispanic adults (61%) and about half of White adults (49%) say the same. People with four-year college degrees (68%) also are more likely than those who have not completed college (50%) to say that Black people and White people are treated differently when it comes to the death penalty.

Chart shows overwhelming majority of Black adults see racial disparities in death penalty sentencing, as do a smaller majority of Hispanic adults; White adults are divided

About eight-in-ten Democrats (83%), including fully 94% of liberal Democrats and three-quarters of conservative and moderate Democrats, say Black people are more likely than White people to be sentenced to death for committing the same type of crime – a view shared by just 25% of Republicans (18% of conservative Republicans and 38% of moderate and liberal Republicans).

Across educational and racial or ethnic groups, majorities say that the death penalty does not deter serious crimes, although there are differences in how widely this view is held. About seven-in-ten (69%) of those with college degrees say this, as do about six-in-ten (59%) of those without college degrees. About seven-in-ten Black adults (72%) and narrower majorities of White (62%) and Hispanic (63%) adults say the same. Asian American adults are more divided, with half saying the death penalty deters serious crimes and a similar share (49%) saying it does not.

Among Republicans, a narrow majority of conservative Republicans (56%) say the death penalty does deter serious crimes, while a similar share of moderate and liberal Republicans (57%) say it does not.

A large majority of liberal Democrats (82%) and a smaller, though still substantial, majority of conservative and moderate Democrats (70%) say the death penalty does not deter serious crimes. But Democrats are divided over whether the death penalty is morally justified. A majority of conservative and moderate Democrats (57%) say that a death sentence is morally justified when someone commits a crime like murder, compared with fewer than half of liberal Democrats (44%).

There is widespread agreement on one topic related to the death penalty: Nearly eight-in-ten (78%) say that there is some risk an innocent person will be put to death, including large majorities among various racial or ethnic, educational, and even ideological groups. For example, about two-thirds of conservative Republicans (65%) say this – compared with 34% who say there are adequate safeguards to ensure that no innocent person will be executed – despite conservative Republicans expressing quite favorable attitudes toward the death penalty on other questions.

Overwhelming share of death penalty supporters say it is morally justified

Those who favor the death penalty consistently express more favorable attitudes regarding specific aspects of the death penalty than those who oppose it.

Chart shows support for death penalty is strongly associated with belief that it is morally justified for crimes like murder

For instance, nine-in-ten of those who favor the death penalty also say that the death penalty is morally justified when someone commits a crime like murder. Just 25% of those who oppose the death penalty say it is morally justified.

This relationship holds among members of each party. Among Republicans and Republican leaners who favor the death penalty, 94% say it is morally justified; 86% of Democrats and Democratic leaners who favor the death penalty also say this.

By comparison, just 35% of Republicans and 21% of Democrats who oppose the death penalty say it is morally justified.

Similarly, those who favor the death penalty are more likely to say it deters people from committing serious crimes. Half of those who favor the death penalty say this, compared with 13% of those who oppose it. And even though large majorities of both groups say there is some risk an innocent person will be put to death, members of the public who favor the death penalty are 24 percentage points more likely to say that there are adequate safeguards to prevent this than Americans who oppose the death penalty.

On the question of whether Black people and White people are equally likely to be sentenced to death for committing similar crimes, partisanship is more strongly associated with these views than one’s overall support for the death penalty: Republicans who oppose the death penalty are more likely than Democrats who favor it to say White people and Black people are equally likely to be sentenced to death.

Among Republicans who favor the death penalty, 78% say that Black and White people are equally likely to receive this sentence. Among Republicans who oppose the death penalty, about half (53%) say this. However, just 26% of Democrats who favor the death penalty say that Black and White people are equally likely to receive this sentence, and only 6% of Democrats who oppose the death penalty say this.

CORRECTION (July 13, 2021): The following sentence was updated to reflect the correct timespan: “Last year, in part because of the coronavirus outbreak, fewer people were executed than in any year in nearly three decades.” The changes did not affect the report’s substantive findings.

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August 7, 2024

The death penalty is the best way to control and reduce serious crime. To what extent do you agree?

“the death penalty is the best way to control and reduce serious crime. to what extent do you agree”, sample answer:.

The issue of whether the death penalty is an effective method for controlling and reducing serious crime is a highly contentious one. While some argue that it acts as a deterrent, others believe that it is inhumane and ineffective. In my opinion, I do not fully agree that the death penalty is the best way to control and reduce serious crime.

Proponents of the death penalty argue that it serves as a strong deterrent to potential criminals. They believe that the fear of facing the ultimate punishment will dissuade individuals from committing heinous crimes. However, there is limited evidence to support this claim. Many studies have shown that the presence of the death penalty does not necessarily lead to a decrease in serious crime rates. In fact, countries that have abolished the death penalty have not experienced a surge in criminal activity.

Furthermore, the implementation of the death penalty raises serious ethical and moral concerns. The irreversible nature of the punishment means that there is always a risk of executing an innocent person. This goes against the fundamental principles of justice and human rights. Additionally, the death penalty does not address the root causes of crime, such as poverty, inequality, and lack of access to education and opportunities. It is a simplistic solution to a complex issue.

Instead of relying on the death penalty, I believe that a more effective approach to controlling and reducing serious crime involves addressing the underlying social and economic factors that contribute to criminal behavior. This includes investing in education, providing support for at-risk individuals, and implementing rehabilitation programs for offenders. By addressing these root causes, we can create a society where crime is less prevalent and individuals are less likely to engage in criminal activities.

In conclusion, while the death penalty may seem like a quick fix for controlling serious crime, it is not the most effective or ethical solution. By addressing the underlying causes of criminal behavior, we can create a safer and more just society for all.

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The death penalty is the best way to control and reduce serious crime. To what extent do you agree or disagree?

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Include an introduction and conclusion

A conclusion is essential for IELTS writing task 2. It is more important than most people realise. You will be penalised for missing a conclusion in your IELTS essay.

The easiest paragraph to write in an essay is the conclusion paragraph. This is because the paragraph mostly contains information that has already been presented in the essay – it is just the repetition of some information written in the introduction paragraph and supporting paragraphs.

The conclusion paragraph only has 3 sentences:

Restatement of thesis
Prediction or recommendation

To summarize, a robotic teacher does not have the necessary disciple to properly give instructions to students and actually works to retard the ability of a student to comprehend new lessons. Therefore, it is clear that the idea of running a classroom completely by a machine cannot be supported. After thorough analysis on this subject, it is predicted that the adverse effects of the debate over technology-driven teaching will always be greater than the positive effects, and because of this, classroom teachers will never be substituted for technology.

Start your conclusion with a linking phrase. Here are some examples:

In conclusion
To conclude
To summarize
In a nutshell

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capital punishment
deterrent effect
sense of justice
wrongful execution
life imprisonment
moral and ethical considerations
rehabilitation
financial and resource implications
desensitize
socio-economic biases
racial biases
retribution
judicial system
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In many countries, people now wear western-style dress such as suits and jeans rather than traditional clothing. Why is this? Is this a positive or negative development?

Many produced food and beverage products include high amount of sugar which leads to many health issues. increasing prices of products with high sugar level to prevent people to consume more sugar. from my perspective, i strongly agree with this statement., ln the future nobody will buy printed newspapers or books because they will be able to read everything they want online without paying. to what extent do you agree or disagree with this statement write at least 250 words., shops should not be allowed to sell any food or drinks that have scientifically proven to be bad for people's health. to what extent do you agree or disagree, the number of people who are at risk of serious health problems due to being overweight is increasing . what are the cause and solutions .

What happened in the Kolkata rape case that triggered doctors’ protests?

Activists and doctors in India demand better safeguarding of women and medical professionals after a trainee medic was raped and murdered in Kolkata.

Following a murder of a 31 year old post-graduate trainee (PGT) doctor by rape and torture inside a government hospital, activists of different humanitarian and political organisations and medical professionals participate in a rally with posters and torches demanding adequate intervention of the ruling government and exemplary punishment of the culprits, in Kolkata, India, Tuesday, Aug. 13, 2024.

Activists and doctors across India continued to protest on Wednesday to demand justice for a female doctor, who was raped and murdered while on duty in a hospital in the eastern city of Kolkata.

Feminist groups rallied on the streets in protests titled “Reclaim the Night” in Kolkata overnight on Wednesday – on the eve of India’s independence day – in solidarity with the victim, demanding the principal of RG Kar Medical College resign. Some feminist protesters also marched well beyond Kolkata, including in the capital Delhi.

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While the protests were largely peaceful, a small mob of men stormed the medical college and vandalised property. This group was dispersed by the police.

This comes after two days of nationwide protests by doctors following the incident at RG Kar Medical College in West Bengal’s capital city. “Sit-in demonstrations and agitation in the hospital campus will continue,” one of the protesting doctors, identified as Dr Mridul, told Al Jazeera.

Services in some medical centres were halted indefinitely, and marches and vigils shed light on issues of sexual violence, as well as doctors’ safety in the world’s most populous nation.

What happened to the doctor in Kolkata?

A 31-year-old trainee doctor’s dead body, bearing multiple injuries, was found on August 9 in a government teaching hospital in Kolkata.

The parents of the victim were initially told “by hospital authorities that their daughter had committed suicide,” lawyer and women’s rights activist Vrinda Grover told Al Jazeera. But an autopsy confirmed that the victim was raped and killed.

Grover has appeared for victims in sexual violence cases in India in the past, including Bilkis Bano , a Muslim woman who was gang-raped during the 2002 Gujarat riots, and Soni Sori, a tribal activist based in Chhattisgarh state.

Thousands of doctors marched in Kolkata on Monday, demanding better security measures and justice for the victim.

On Tuesday, the Kolkata High Court transferred the case to the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI).

The Federation of Resident Doctors Association (FORDA) called for a nationwide halting of elective services in hospitals starting on Monday. Elective services are medical treatments that can be deferred or are not deemed medically necessary.

Doctors hold posters to protest the rape and murder of a young medic from Kolkata, at the Government General Hospital in Vijayawada on August 14

On Tuesday, FORDA announced on its X account that it is calling off the strike after Health Minister Jagat Prakash Nadda accepted protest demands.

One of these demands was solidifying the Central Protection Act, intended to be a central law to protect medical professionals from violence, which was proposed in the parliament’s lower house in 2022, but has not yet been enacted.

FORDA said that the ministry would begin working on the Act within 15 days of the news release, and that a written statement from the ministry was expected to be released soon.

Press release regarding call off of strike. In our fight for the sad incident at R G Kar, the demands raised by us have been met in full by the @OfficeofJPNadda , with concrete steps in place, and not just verbal assurances. Central Healthcare Protection Act ratification… pic.twitter.com/OXdSZgM1Jc — FORDA INDIA (@FordaIndia) August 13, 2024

Why are some Indian doctors continuing to protest?

However, other doctors’ federations and hospitals have said they will not back down on the strike until a concrete solution is found, including a central law to curb attacks on doctors.

Those continuing to strike included the Federation of All India Medical Associations (FAIMA), Delhi-based All India Institute Of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) and Indira Gandhi Hospital, local media reported.

Ragunandan Dixit, the general secretary of the AIIMS Resident Doctors’ Association, said that the indefinite strike will continue until their demands are met, including a written guarantee of the implementation of the Central Protection Act.

Medical professionals in India want a central law that makes violence against doctors a non-bailable, punishable offence, in hopes that it deters such violent crimes against doctors in the future.

Those continuing to protest also call for the dismissal of the principal of the college, who was transferred. “We’re demanding his termination, not just transfer,” Dr Abdul Waqim Khan, a protesting doctor told ANI news agency. “We’re also demanding a death penalty for the criminal,” he added.

“Calling off the strike now would mean that female resident doctors might never receive justice,” Dr Dhruv Chauhan, member of the National Council of the Indian Medical Association’s Junior Doctors’ Network told local news agency Press Trust of India (PTI).

Which states in India saw doctors’ protests?

While the protests started in West Bengal’s Kolkata on Monday, they spread across the country on Tuesday.

The capital New Delhi, union territory Chandigarh, Uttar Pradesh capital Lucknow and city Prayagraj, Bihar capital Patna and southern state Goa also saw doctors’ protests.

Interactive_India_doctor_rape_protests_August14_2024

Who is the suspect in the Kolkata rape case?

Local media reported that the police arrested suspect Sanjoy Roy, a civic volunteer who would visit the hospital often. He has unrestricted access to the ward and the police found compelling evidence against him.

The parents of the victim told the court that they suspect that it was a case of gang rape, local media reported.

Why is sexual violence on the rise in India?

Sexual violence is rampant in India, where 90 rapes were reported on average every day in 2022.

Laws against sexual violence were made stricter following a rape case in 2012, when a 22-year-old physiotherapy intern was brutally gang-raped and murdered on a bus in Delhi. Four men were hanged for the gang rape, which had triggered a nationwide protests.

But despite new laws in place, “the graph of sexual violence in India continues to spiral unabated,” said Grover.

She added that in her experience at most workplaces, scant attention is paid to diligent and rigorous enforcement of the laws.

“It is regrettable that government and institutions respond only after the woman has already suffered sexual assault and often succumbed to death in the incident,” she added, saying preventive measures are not taken.

In many rape cases in India, perpetrators have not been held accountable. In 2002, Bano was raped by 11 men, who were sentenced to life imprisonment. In 2022, the government of Prime Minister Narendra Modi authorised the release of the men, who were greeted with applause and garlands upon their release.

However, their remission was overruled and the Supreme Court sent the rapists back to jail after public outcry.

Grover believes that the death penalty will not deter rapists until India addresses the deeply entrenched problem of sexual violence. “For any change, India as a society will have to confront and challenge, patriarchy, discrimination and inequality that is embedded in our homes, families, cultural practices, social norms and religious traditions”.

What makes this case particularly prominent is that it happened in Kolkata, Sandip Roy, a freelance contributor to NPR, told Al Jazeera. “Kolkata actually prided itself for a long time on being really low in the case of violence against women and being relatively safe for women.”

A National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) report said that Kolkata had the lowest number of rape cases in 2021 among 19 metropolitan cities, with 11 cases in the whole year. In comparison, New Delhi was reported to have recorded 1, 226 cases that year.

Prime Minister Modi’s governing Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has called for dismissing the government in West Bengal, where Kolkata is located, led by Mamata Banerjee of All India Trinamool Congress (AITC). Banerjee’s party is part of the opposition alliance.

Rahul Gandhi, the leader of the opposition in parliament, also called for justice for the victim.

“The attempt to save the accused instead of providing justice to the victim raises serious questions on the hospital and the local administration,” he posted on X on Wednesday.

Roy spoke about the politicisation of the case since an opposition party governs West Bengal. “The local government’s opposition will try to make this an issue of women’s safety in the state,” he said.

Have doctors in India protested before?

Roy explained to Al Jazeera that this case is an overlap of two kinds of violence, the violence against a woman, as well as violence against “an overworked medical professional”.

Doctors in India do not have sufficient workplace security, and attacks on doctors have started protests in India before.

In 2019, two junior doctors were physically assaulted in Kolkata’s Nil Ratan Sircar Medical College and Hospital (NRSMCH) by a mob of people after a 75-year-old patient passed away in the hospital.

Those attacks set off doctors’ protests in Kolkata, and senior doctors in West Bengal offered to resign from their positions to express solidarity with the junior doctors who were attacked.

More than 75 percent of Indian doctors have faced some form of violence, according to a survey by the Indian Medical Association in 2015.

What happens next?

The case will now be handled by the CBI, which sent a team to the hospital premises to inspect the crime scene on Wednesday morning, local media reported.

According to Indian law, the investigation into a case of rape or gang rape is to be completed within two months from the date of lodging of the First Information Report (police complaint), according to Grover, the lawyer.

The highest court in West Bengal, which transferred the case from the local police to the CBI on Tuesday, has directed the central investigating agency to file periodic status reports regarding the progress of the investigation.

The FIR was filed on August 9, which means the investigation is expected to be completed by October 9.

Bengal women will create history with a night long protest in various major locations in the state for at 11.55pm on 14th of August’24,the night that’ll mark our 78th year as an independent country. The campaign, 'Women, Reclaim the Night: The Night is Ours', is aimed at seeking… pic.twitter.com/Si9fd6YGNb — purpleready (@epicnephrin_e) August 13, 2024

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Capital Punishment refers to the practice where a person is killed by a State as a punishment for a crime. Instead of serving a lifelong custodial sentence, the criminal will wait on 'death row', eventually being executed. There are many different ways that the death penalty may be carried out. Hanging, firing squad and lethal injection are ...
(PDF) The Dilemma of Death Penalty
This essay examines Death Penalty, a contemporary social issue in the world today. It gives a. general idea of what death penalty means and shows the argument revolving around th e. implementation ...
Death Penalty Free Essay Examples And Topic Ideas
83 essay samples found. The death penalty, also known as capital punishment, remains a contentious issue in many societies. Essays on this topic could explore the moral, legal, and social arguments surrounding the practice, including discussions on retribution, deterrence, and justice. They might delve into historical trends in the application ...
Essay: Arguments against the Death Penalty
The racial and economic bias is not a valid argument against the death penalty. It is an argument against the courts and their unfair system of sentencing. The third argument is actually a rebuttal to a claim made by some supporters of the death penalty. The claim is that the threat of capital punishment reduces violent crimes.
The pros and cons of the death penalty
Pro: public support. Although use of the death penalty is gradually declining in the US, a 2021 survey by Gallup found a majority of Americans (54%) said they were "in favour of the death penalty ...
Capital punishment
Capital punishment - Arguments, Pros/Cons: Capital punishment has long engendered considerable debate about both its morality and its effect on criminal behaviour. Contemporary arguments for and against capital punishment fall under three general headings: moral, utilitarian, and practical. Supporters of the death penalty believe that those who commit murder, because they have taken the life ...
Most Americans Favor the Death Penalty Despite Concerns About Its
The data in the most recent survey, collected from Pew Research Center's online American Trends Panel (ATP), finds that 60% of Americans favor the death penalty for persons convicted of murder.Over four ATP surveys conducted since September 2019, there have been relatively modest shifts in these views - from a low of 60% seen in the most recent survey to a high of 65% seen in September ...
A Position Paper On The Death Penalty in The Philippines
A Position Paper on the Death Penalty in the Philippines - Free download as Word Doc (.doc / .docx), PDF File (.pdf), Text File (.txt) or read online for free. This paper discusses the arguments for and against the death penalty in the Philippines. It outlines the history of the death penalty in the country and how it has been imposed at different times.
The death penalty is the best way to control and reduce serious crime
The issue of whether the death penalty is an effective method for controlling and reducing serious crime is a highly contentious one. While some argue that it acts as a deterrent, others believe that it is inhumane and ineffective. In my opinion, I do not fully agree that the death penalty is the best way to control and reduce serious crime.
ANTI Death Penalty Argumentative Essay
ANTI-DEATH PENALTY ARGUMENTATIVE ESSAY. Introduction Death penalty is a type of punishment where it practices putting a person to death for committing a crime. Crimes punishable by death are murder, crimes against humanity, treason and more. Execution includes beheading, electrocution, hanging, lethal injection, and shooting in the back of the ...
The death penalty is the best way to control and reduce ...
On the contrary. , death. penalty. is necessary to maintain law and order in the society else no criminal will feel fear. The strict punishments induce fear in the mind of offenders. Thus. , they might think of punishment before planning and plotting of the lawlessness and can decide to refrain themselves. Furthermore.
What happened in the Kolkata rape case that triggered doctors' protests
Grover believes that the death penalty will not deter rapists until India addresses the deeply entrenched problem of sexual violence. "For any change, India as a society will have to confront ...

Arguments for and Against the Death Penalty

Retribution

Arbitrariness & Discrimination

Top 10 Pro & Con Arguments

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Death Penalty: Arguments For and Against Essay

Introduction

Journal of Practical Ethics

The Death Penalty Can Ensure ‘Justice Is Being Done’

The Death Penalty - your questions answered

1. Why does Amnesty International oppose the death penalty?

2. Don’t victims of violent crime and their families have a right to justice?

3. If you kill someone else, don’t you deserve to die, too – “an eye for an eye”?

4. Doesn’t the death penalty prevent crime?

5. What about capital punishment for terrorists?

6. Isn’t it better to execute someone than to lock them up forever?

7. Is there a humane and painless way to execute a person?

8. What business is it of Amnesty’s if different societies want to use the death penalty?

9. What if public opinion is in favour of the death penalty?

10. Is the battle to abolish the death penalty being won?

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