Capital Punishment: Is the Death Penalty Justice or Revenge?
“To take a life when a life has been lost is revenge, not justice.” Desmond Tutu
For quite some time, people have argued whether or not Capital Punishment/Death Penalty should be abolished. Some argue that it is necessary because it is a deterrent for crime, and that it supported a direct quote from the bible, “An eye for an eye; a tooth for a tooth.” Others argue that no one, other than God, has the right to judge whether someone deserves to die, and that the Death Penalty is immoral. I am against the death penalty. In my opinion, it has nothing to do with justice; and is a legal (but immoral) form of killing for revenge. I also feel as if it is a violation of the second amendment of the Constitution. Teaching people not to kill, by killing, is hypocrital, and makes absolutely no sense to me. The purpose of this essay is to compare and contrast arguments for and against the death penalty, and to further explain why I believe that the death penalty should be abolished.
One of the most common arguments comes up from people who are in favor of the death penalty is that it is, in fact necessary, because it is serves as a deterrent to crime. In other words, people believe that dangling the possibility over a potential criminal’s head will stop them from committing that particular crime. I do not agree with this argument. Studies have proven that the crime rate is not exceptionally lower in states that that have the death penalty. Studies also show that crime rates are not exceptionally higher in states that do not have the death penalty. Through research, I have found that of the fifty states in America, twelve do not practice the death penalty. An additional twelve states have not abolished the death penalty, but have not used this practice in over fifty years. In 2006, the US Census Bureau reported that twenty-three of those twenty-four states had a lower rate of crime than any of the states that...