Subject: The Pro-death penalty argument
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To members of this mailing list:
I recently posted a note in which I expressed support for the death
penalty. While I realize that the purpose of this mailing list is to provide
an avenue of communication amongst those of you (a small minority, I might
add) who oppose capital punishment, I think it is both prudent and educational
to keep dialogue open, especially on such an important matter.
A few of you have replied to my posting with your arguments against
the death penalty, and they all take on these forms:
1. Capital punishment is brutal, inhumane, and is an affront to civilized
persons everywhere.
2. CP raises the level of brutality in society, and would eventually heighten
violent tendencies in people.
3. There is statistical evidence that "proves" that CP is not an effective
deterrent.
4. The crime problem can not be solved through punishment, but through
remedying social ills that are the root cause of crime.
* * * *
Argument # 1 is incomprehensible. CP is a reasoned response to the
overwhelming problem of violence in society. It is not inhumane to prevent the
incorrigibly violent from committing heinous acts against innocent,
law-abiding citizens by dealing with them quickly and absolutely. More
inhumane is caging them in an 8 X 8 jail cell for decades at a time. Moreover,
criminals in jails may escape or be paroled, at which time they are free to
commit further atrocities. CP is the ultimate special deterrent; as such, it
prevents the convicted offender from further harming society.
Argument # 2 is equally incomprehensible. EXACTLY WHO is going to
become more brutal or inhuman through the implementation of CP? The criminal?
How can murder or rape become MORE brutal? Do the opponents of CP have
blueprints showing gradients of brutality? If not the criminal, then who?
Law-abiding citizens?? How? Will the fact that our streets are safer and our
living standards raised somehow breed an hitherto unknown hostility in each of
us that will vent itself on a national scale? Come now, people, this argument
is sophomoric.
Argument # 3 may indeed be true. (I have not seen comprehensive
statistical studies, but I have vague recollections of scattered studies done
in various parts of the US and Europe that suggest CP in not a deterrent). But
even if # 3 is true, that is not an argument against CP, but an argument
against the WAY CP HAS BEEN IMPLEMENTED. An example: the State of New Jersey
has embraced the death penalty since gaining statehood, yet only THREE people
have been executed in NJ's history! Where is the deterrence to be found in a
law that is not enforced? Let's face it, the US Supreme Court's expansionist
reading of the due process clause in the last thirty years has rendered CP
totally impotent. But that is not an argument against CP, but against lack of
enforcement.
In response to those who argue that European countries without the death
penalty have lower crime rates than the US, I say this: lower (violent) crime
rates in those countries exist not BECAUSE of the absence of CP but DESPITE
it. I hope the statistical argument put forth by some of you concentrate on
VIOLENT CRIME. The death penalty is a punishment for criminals who are most
violent, most resistant to rehabilitation. I do not argue that CP will lower
the crime rate in all categories (but only those categories punishable by
death). So to say that the European OVERALL crime rate is lower than that of
the US is to completely miss the issue. Can someone provide a study that
measures violent crime rates in areas that never practice CP and areas that
practice it frequently (perhaps Cuba)?
At any rate, one can not compare the European crime phenomenon with the US
crime phenomenon. The enormous heterogenity of American culture, with its
gaping class discrepancies and racial tensions, are (comparatively speaking)
unknown to Europeans (who are largely all of the same color, share a common
history, speak the same tongue, etc). Most of the violent crime committed in
America is committed by black Americans. The remark is not meant to offend
anyone, but to illustrate that the nature of the American crime problem is
different than the crime problems of other nations. What is the black
population (or its analogue) in European countries? In what great numbers are
there disenfranchised, impoverished, marginalized people of a different color
in, say, Sweden? You begin to see the point, I'm sure.
I agree 100% with Argument # 4. But CP is not proffered (not by me,
anyway) as a SOLUTION to crime. It is not even a solution to violent crime.
But it is a viable, and I believe, effective, first step towards making
society safer, better. It will make society safer and better in the following
ways:
a. it will act as a general deterrent to those who may contemplate acts
of violence by instilling in people the notion that very bad acts
WILL be VERY SEVERELY punished (this is not a reality now even in
areas that legalize CP);
b. it will act as a special deterrent against the violent criminals
themselves, ensuring that they never harm society again (there is no
argument against this claim . . . if you believe nothing else I say,
you must agree that CP makes society safer by ending the potential
threat of a violent criminal);
c. revenues spent on sustaining those criminals who would otherwise
(if CP was implemented effectively) be killed for their crimes could
be better channeled into social programs that emphasize education,
early intervention, rehabilitation;
d. it will instill in the citizenry a renewed faith in the justice
system, and will lower instances of vigilantism, and empower victims
of rape (ie, women) to report those crimes (yes, I believe under
certain circumstances, rape ought to be punishable by death);
One last note . . . I would like to conduct an informal survey, if I may. The
survey question is this:
If Adolf Hitler was captured after WWII, tried and convicted at Nuremberg,
what would have been an appropriate sentence?
Thank you for your patience.
Sincerely,
Daniel A. Dorry, Esq.
