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capital

capital Capital Punishment Justice can not be served until the debate on capital punishment is resolved and all states have come to an agreement that the death penalty is the best way to stop crime completely. “The bottom line is, one method of execution is just as brutal as the next,” says Mr. Breedlove of the National Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty. Webster’s Dictionary New Riverside Desk Dictionary II Edition, defines execution as the act of putting someone to death lawfully. So if Breedlove’s words hold to be true, then what he believes is that someone going out a killing someone else is barbaric. In a sense he is saying that one way of killing is just as bad as any other. So if he finds this to be such a barbaric action why doesn’t he do anything about it? Many people including people like Breedlove are only thinking of the criminal in this type of situation, yet do they ever stop to think about the families of these murder victims. The pain, the anguish, and the immense suffering these loved ones go through because of the actions of these merciless criminals. If you can, draw up from your memory the actions of Susan Smith. Yes that’s right the woman whom drove her two innocent kids in to the lake. She willingly drove her car into the lake as her two young sons sit seatbelted in the backseat of her car. Susan then got out of the car and watched as the cabin of the car filled up with the icy cold water eventually drowning the two. Just think of how they felt as they sit in the car crying for their mother frantically, wondering “why mommy left them there?”. Barbaric…Barbaric is exactly how I would describe her actions. Yet, the jury doing her case sentenced her to life not death. Mr. Smith, the father of the two, broken up by the ruling said, “me and my family are disappointed that the death penalty was not the verdict, but it wasn’t our choice. They returned a verdict that they thought was just.” (L.A Times). But is it justice, that she was let off the hook for murdering her two innocent children. How could they possibly let her off? They (The Jury) only explained that she would suffer more through her depression, but does that justify the short-lived lives of two completely harmless, defenseless and innocent children. If we give up our punishing of deadly criminals then could throw our social atmosphere through a violent loop of chaos. In today’s society the idea of having deadly criminals: sentenced to life in prison, get paroled and then go back into society and strike again is absolutely frightening. Another thing that has become a threat in today’s society is the fact that we have slacked up on the punishment of our criminals. It’s hard to believe that today everyone has the exact same rights, whether you have been convicted of mass murder or are just a regular “Joe” off the streets. When you are willing to go against the specific laws of our society morally and physically you should be stripped of nearly all your rights. “In the late 1950’s on any one given day there were two-hundred prisoners awaiting their executions,” says Hugo Becker of Tufts University, Massachusetts. Most anti-capital punishment activist will argue that the death penalty is gruesome. Yet nearly all forms of capital punishment, whether it be lethal injection, electrocution, firing squad, the gas chamber or by hanging is in many people’s opinions equally as painfully even slightly less painful than rotting away in your jail cell for the rest of your life on this earth. So for those who say we are playing God when we kill someone, they need to realize that either way we choose how this person dies. Through all controversies including cost (see chart #1) and deterrence through executions. We as a society will always have crime, because there is no such Utopia otherwise. Unlike the many cases where convicted felons have bee prosecuted and paroled, and murderers have murdered again, executions we will ultimately deter crime. Has there ever in the history of the United States been a case where an executed man has murder again...Didn’t think so (see chart #2). But, will it deter the public from committing these same crimes? Since the 19th Century, we do not have public executions. These executions used to be a public event. This to some people was dishonorably and crude, yet these people got to see first hand what was going to happen to them if they committed a crime of that nature. Today you rarely hear of such executions let alone see them. The only executions we see are on the news, at such events like Columbine, Colorado. This mass execution was not put on by the legal system, yet only by two young boys out for vengeance. Some people will also argue that the capital punishment system is such an uncivilized harsh way of treating these criminals, but can you take a look at them and tell everyone that they themselves are acting civilized…certainly not! These criminals can not expect to be treated civilized when they have not acted civilly themselves. With that, consider the old saying, “treat other how you want to be treated.” These criminals are the ones whom turn our nation into an uncivilized one; they themselves are the most uncivilized human beings on the earth. If anything is to be said it would have to be that the death penalty is not enough. It can never bring back the many loved ones to the families that have lost them. If we can not join together in crime and its prevention, it will most certainly defeat us (as a nation). We can no longer sit back and passively watch as our communities are being destroyed. There must be a line drawn in crime. When people say it is retributive justice to take the life in turn for the taking of another life, it could be said that a criminal could not learn a lesson since he dies as an immediate result of his punishment. Yet the only true way to pay for a violent crime is through death. We live in a society today where killings happen on a day to day basis, and many get away with it. Those who do get caught don’t usually stay in that cell for the rest of their life. For a cold-blooded killer, capital punishment is the only true justice. No executed murderer has ever murdered again. Bibliography:

Word Count: 1104