Capital Punishment aka Death Penalty
Uploaded by unfixedshihtzu on Jul 14, 2008
Capital punishment, also known as the death penalty, is the toughest form of punishment enforced today in the United States. It is a controversial issue that continues to be debated by the American public. One of the biggest issues being debated is whether or not the death penalty is immoral, excessively cruel or inhumane. I support capital punishment and do not believe that it is cruel or inhumane but that it delivers a small sense of closure to the public.
The death penalty is an issue that divides our country. Currently, 65% of Americans support the death penalty for those convicted of murder. This number drops to 50% when a mandatory life in prison sentence is also offered. With an infinite number of variables in cases and in sentencing options, it is easy to see why there are so many different opinions.
The National Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty (NCADP) is the only fully staffed, national organization committed to removing capital punishment from the nation. Some of the main points that the NCADP brings up are that the death penalty is racially biased, the death penalty cost more to implement than life without parole, the death penalty does not deter capital crime, and that innocent people may be executed. There are also a number of groups that support the death penalty. These groups use the same statistics as the anti-death penalty groups to shine a different light on the same key issues surrounding the death penalty.
Racial Bias
The NCADP states that “In North Carolina, the odds of receiving a death sentence are 3.5 times higher among defendants whose victims were white,” and “The odds of receiving a death sentence in Philadelphia are 38% higher in cases in which the defendant is black.” However, pro death penalty groups share these facts, “…found that white murderers received the death penalty slightly more often (32%) than non-white murderers (27%). And while the study found murderers of white victims received the death penalty more often (32%) than murderers of non-white victims (23%), when controlled for variables such as severity and number of crimes committed, there is no disparity between those sentenced to death for killing white or black victims.” The deciding factor on this issue is the official inmate population numbers from the United States Department of Justice. Since 1976, whites have outnumbered...