Capital Punishment - The Case against Death Penalty - Report Example

Capital Punishment: The case against death penalty Capital Punishment, more commonly known as the death penalty, is a form of punishment and retribution which involves the killing of a person through judicial means. For some, the death penalty is an important deterrent which is effective in deterring capital crimes such as murder and armed assault. For others, such as the Death Penalty Information Centre, the death penalty is a cruel and unusual punishment which is often arbitrarily applied with dire consequences. Although controversial, states around the world apply the death penalty and the United States remains an active proponent of this particular form of punishment for what it deems to be the most heinous of crimes. As abolition becomes an important issue around the world, advocates of the death penalty face an uphill battle as important international organizations such as the United Nations and the European Union have recently debated the validity of this particular form of punishment. Accordingly, the European Union, in its Charter of Fundamental Rights, has effectively banned this practice in all of its member states. Seeking to explore the death penalty through an analysis of the deterrent argument as well as the application of lethal injection, a potentially cruel and unusual punishment, the following will analyze quantitative data surrounding the global use of death penalty and persuasively argue that the death penalty should be banned. While the deterrence factor is brought into question, this essay will argue that lethal injection runs contrary to the prohibition against “cruel and unusual punishment” and thus should be banned in its entirety (The Death Penalty Information Centre 2009; Hood 2008). According to the Death Penalty Information Centre, there has been a global trend towards the abolishment of the death penalty. Despite this trend, there are a handful of countries in the world which continue to use the death penalty as a form of punishment. While 92 countries have now abolished the death penalty (including France, Canada and the United Kingdom), 59 countries worldwide continue to have death penalty legislation on their books. China, Saudi Arabia, the United States and Pakistan remain some of the largest supporters of the death penalty with China the overwhelming leader in total executions worldwide. Is the death penalty a deterrent? It is to this question that we now turn (Hood 2008; Robert 2000). The Death Penalty: A Real Deterrent? In addition to the plethora of ethical issues surrounding the death penalty, advocates of the death penalty argue that capital punishment works as an effective deterrent and thus is effective in preventing crime. According to the British Broadcasting Corporation, the general consensus among researchers is that the deterrent effect of the death penalty remains unproven. Accordingly, a survey undertaken by the United Nations in 1988 attempted to explore the relationship between the death penalty and homicide rates. According to this analysis, the United Nations concluded that “research has failed to provide scientific proof that executions have a greater deterrent effect than life imprisonment. Such proof is unlikely to be forthcoming. The evidence as a whole still gives no positive support to the deterrent hypothesis.” (British Broadcasting Corporation 2009). Accordingly, research from the United States has consistently demonstrated that states without the death penalty have lower murder rates, thus brining into question the entire deterrence explanation for the death penalty. In fact, studies have shown that in the United States, states which do not have the death penalty on the books have a lower murder rate than those that do. Tracking this phenomenon over a seventeen year period from 1990 to 2009, scholar David Cooper has shown that states without the death penalty have far less incidences of homicide. Accordingly, in the year 2007 alone the murder rate in states without the death penalty was a full 47% lower than in states in which the death penalty was in place. These trends are shocking in that they completely dispel the myth concerning the deterrence factor of the death penalty. Could it be that non-death penalty states are less violent and/or less prone to violence? New York state, one of the most populous states in the Union is presently a non-death penalty state. Perhaps that is not a viable explanation. For more information on the murder rate discrepancies see a snapshot of Cooper’s study (1990-2006) below from the Death Penalty Information Centre: As the chart above so clearly demonstrates, the murder rate in the United States has effectively been declining since 1990 and a sixteen year period, the murder rate in non-death penalty states has always been lower than in states which use the death penalty. According to the New York Times: states without the death penalty have lower homicide rates than states with the death penalty. The Times reports that ten of the twelve states without the death penalty have homicide rates below the national average, whereas half of the states with the death penalty have homicide rates above. During the last 20 years, the homicide rate in states with the death penalty has been 48% - 101% higher than in states without the death penalty (Death Penalty Information Centre 2009). This trend is evidenced throughout the United States as well as around the world. The description of the death penalty as a deterrent is often a smokescreen used to hide other motives, often political and always insidious. Accordingly, this dispels the deterrence myth and lends credence to the argument that the death penalty is nothing more than state-sponsored homicide. Lethal Injection: Cruel and Unusual? Lethal injection, a particularly insidious form of capital punishment, is practiced throughout the United States and the world and aims to execute a convicted offender through the injection of a fatal amount of drugs. It is undeniably the most commonly practiced form of capital punishment in the United States today. For advocates of the death penalty, lethal injection is a more humane punishment than other forms of execution commonly practiced over history such as beheading (practiced often in historical times) electrocution (through the now infamous electric chair), by firing quad or by gas chamber, among others. Today, lethal injection is a common form of execution throughout the United States. The Death Penalty Information Centre reports that in 2005, every execution conducted in the United States was conducted through lethal injection. An overwhelming majority of states in the United States use this form of execution as a primary or secondary method of execution (at last count there were 32 states which practiced lethal injection as a method of execution). China adopted this method more than a decade ago but the United States remains the country in which this method was devised and in which it is the most commonly accepted form of punishment. Despite feelings to the contrary, the use of lethal injection as a primary means to execute a prisoner should be classified as “cruel and unusual punishment” and thus illegal under American law (The Death Penalty Information Centre 2009). American jurisprudence has utilized the term “cruel and unusual punishment” to apply to the prohibition of any form of punishment which meets the criteria above. This term appears in the Eight Amendment to the United States Constitution, first appearing in 1787, and has been enshrined as a legal principle since the 17th century in England and remains alive today through a variety of legislative organs including the United States Constitution, the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, the European Convention on Human Rights and the United Nation’s Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Does execution through lethal injection constitute “cruel and unusual punishment”? According to many, it certainly does. Death through chemical injection is certainly an usual way to die and the certainty that the chemical cocktail will in fact induce death is in doubt. If the chemical cocktail fails to produce immediate death, the prisoner could be in excruciating pain prior to death (sometimes as long as 45 minutes), thus constituting cruel and unusual punishment. State challenges to lethal injection through the cruel and unusual punishment clause of the US Constitution, led to the state of New Jersey to officially prohibit the death penalty, the first state to do so since the death penalty was reinstated by the American Supreme Court in 1976. Because there is the potential for excruciating pain as well as for botching the entire execution, lethal injection must be banned – as has been done in New Jersey – because it contravenes the cruel and unusual punishment clause of the American Constitution (“New Jersey”, British Broadcasting Corporation 2009; Hood 2008). Concluding Remarks According to the United Nations, the abolition of the death penalty is a global trend and a handful of countries continue to practice this insidious form of punishment with near impunity. In 2003, of all known executions, 84% took place in four countries, namely China, Iran, the United States and Vietnam. This is a very unlikely club for the United States to join. China led the pack with more executions than all four countries above but the inclusion of the United States in this infamous group does not bode well for the international reputation of this country. There are many problems with the death penalty in general and lethal injection in particular. The nature in which it is applied is cruel and unusual nature – both the electric chair and lethal injection are both highly cruel punishments – and these are fundamental flaws with the death penalty. Because this form of punishment has been proven to be cruel and unusual, and the deterrent factor is highly questionable, capital punishment must be banned in the United States and around the world (“Capital”, British Broadcasting Corporation 2009). references British Broadcasting Corporation. (2009). Capital Punishment: Deterrence. Last Accessed Sept. 02 2009, http://www.bbc.co.uk/ethics/capitalpunishment/against_5.shtml Hood, R. (2008). Death Penalty: A World-Wide Perspective. London: Oxford University Press. British Broadcasting Corporation. (2009). New Jersey Scraps Death Penalty. ). Last Accessed Sept. 02 2009, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/7143597.stm Roberts, R. (2000). Review. The Journal of American History. 87:3 (2000): 1167-1168. The Death Penalty Information Centre. (2009). Last Accessed Sept. 02 2009, http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org Read More