Cruelty of Capital Punishment
Cruelty of Capital PunishmentCapital punishment is the legal infliction the death penalty.
It is obviously the most severe form of criminal punishment. (Bedau1)
Capital punishment is a controversial way of dealing with violent
criminals. The main alternative to the death penalty is life in
prison. Capital punishment has been around for thousands of years as a
means of eradicating criminals. A giant debate started between
supporters and opposers of execution, over the morality and
effectiveness of the death penalty. The supporters claim that if you
take a life you should pay with your life or "an eye for an eye".
Opposers of the death penalty bring up the chance of sentencing the
innocent and how the death penalty is inhumane. The purpose of this
paper is to examine the process of capital punishment and the moral
viewpoints on the death penalty. The first evidence of capital
punishment is from Hammurabi's code, a book of Babylonian law, from
1700BC. The Bible mentions that execution should be used for many
crimes. (Bedau1) One example of the death penalty in the bible is
"Whoever strikes a man so that he dies shall be put to death." (Exodus
21:12). The bible also suggests stoning a woman if she unmarried sex
and had "wrought folly on Israel by playing the harlot in her father's
house" (Deuteronomy 22:21) England recognized seven major crimes that
called for execution by the end of the 15th century. These crimes
were: murder, theft (by deceitfully taking someone goods), burglary,
rape, and arson. As time went by more and more crimes were believed to
deserve the death penalty and by 1800 more than 200 crimes were
recognized as punishable by death. (Bedau2) It was not long before
capital punishment met opposition. The Quakers made first movement
against execution. They supported life imprisonment as a more humane
justice. Cesare Beccaria wrote On Crimes and Punishment, a book
criticizing torture and the death penalty, in 1764. Cesare drove many
other philosophers, like Voltaire and Jerry Bentham, to question the
validity of using capital punishment. (Bedau2) Contrary to what some
may believe the process of sentencing a defendant is a very arduous
and time-taking ordeal. After he has been arrested as the suspect of a
crime the defendant will either tried in a state or federal court
system. The lowest court that a litigant can be sent to is the Court
of General jurisdiction (state level) or the US District Courts
(federal level). Any time in the trial the defense may choose to
appeal. Even if a suspect is sentenced to a crime the case may be
appealed for a variety of reasons. The defendant's lawyer could claim
that the defendant's rights were violated when he was arrested, that
the defendant received an unfair trial, or new evidence that could
prove the defendant's innocence has surfaced. (Guernsey,16) Next the
appeal is taken to the Intermediate Appellate Courts (state) or the US
Courts of Appeals (federal) who will...
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