FREE ESSAY ON CAPITAL PUNISHMENT?

CAPITAL PUNISHMENT?

The Bible has many stories we can share for different reasons. Rather it be Adam and Eve,
Noah and the Ark, or David and Goliath, we use the stories for lessons in our lives.
Capitol Punishment can also relate to one of the stories.
The Villagers gathered with their stones. The Criminal was a woman who was convicted of
adultery. As the villagers raised their hands ready to throw the stone Jesus came and
stepped in front of the woman. Looking at the angered villagers he said, "He who has no
sin shall cast the first stone." The villagers all dropped their stones.
This story represents my opinion on capitol punishment. No one on the earth is completely
without sin and almost everyone could be punished. But being the hypocritical society we
are today we still go on relentlessly persecuting those who we see as lower than us. 
It's not just Christians who protest the misuse of capitol punishment. Capital punishment
goes against almost every religion. Although isolated passages of the Bible have been
quoted in support of the death penalty, almost all religious groups in the United States
regard executions as immoral. 
Capital punishment also is an ineffective punishment for those who commit crimes seeing
the death penalty as the "easy way out." Scientific studies have consistently failed to
demonstrate that executions deter people from committing crime. The respected Thorsten
Sellin studies of the United States in 1962, 1967 and 1980 concluded that the death
penalty was not a deterrent.
When our founding fathers of America designed the Constitution which is the base of our
government they had to make ten Bill of Rights for the satisfaction of all thirteen
colonies. One of those ten Bill of Rights was the eighth one which said under any
circumstances that the United States could not use any cruel or unusual crimes. Death
penalty opponents, including many religious groups and individuals, and a growing number
of prison wardens, maintain that capital punishment constitutes cruel and unusual
punishment in violation of the Eighth Amendment. Killing, whether carried out by an
individual or the state, is immoral and ought not to be condoned.
Maybe the punishment wouldn't be as bad if there was absolute surety that the person the
jury was putting on death row was guilty but as most systems in the United States the
Capitol punishment system to has it's serious faults. The only difference between the
other faulty US systems and the faulty capitol punishment system is that the capitol
punishment system can cause an innocent person to die. Studies show that in this century,
at least 400 innocent people have been convicted of capital crimes they did not commit.
Of those 400, 23 were executed. The wrongful execution of an innocent person is an
injustice that can never be rectified.
With the faulty capitol punishment system, comes money. Because of their ignorance to the
subject many people who are pro-capitol punishment argue that it would cost less to just
go ahead and finish the prisoner off than to pay for their living habits in jail for the
rest of the prisoner's life. The truth of the matter is that a new study has proven that
it cost 3.1 million dollars for an execution to take place in Florida. Keeping the
prisoner in prison is almost half of that much. And if they want to die any way, capitol
punishment is the better punishment. 
I'm not saying that a serial killer who has raped and killed seven people should be
allowed to stay in a nice facilitated jail and for good behavior get parol in ten years.
I think that the punishment should be at least fifty years in prison without parol. The
atmosphere in prison alone is a hell of its own and I'm sure the labor that could be
assigned to the murderer would be worse enough. As I have mentioned two times before,
prisoners want the death penalty as a means of an "easy way out."
Today more than 3,300 people are on death row. Executions -- by hanging, electrocution,
lethal injection, and even by firing squad -- have become almost commonplace. Regardless
of which method is used, the death penalty is a barbaric anachronism and should be
abolished
We teach our children that it is not right to kill. Even the sixth commandment of the
Bible says, "Thou Shall not kill." Still we take the role in the judicial system and
chose who lives and who dies. Not only are we being hypocritical to what we say our
morals are, but we are also teaching our children that it is okay to kill certain people
and it is by this that capitol punishment is still practiced today.