This was submitted as my final research paper for English Composition and thought that it would be nice to share my views against the death penalty. Thanks for letting me post here. I hope everyone enjoys it. Happy reading!
Rick
Capital Punishment in the United States
Since the first recorded execution in 1608, opponents have fought to abolish capital punishment in America. Activists from every walk of life have joined the fight against government sanctioned murder. People from clergy, heads of state, actors and normal citizens have taken up the cause to stop capital punishment. The policy of taking a person’s life for that of another has not been an effective deterrent. It has in the past been ruled as being cruel and unusual punishment by the United States Supreme Court. (Court 1972)
At the start of 2008, 12 states have opted not to implement death penalty sanctions as a punishment for capital crimes. Some on moral issues, others because the system appears to be flawed in many ways. In 10 of the 12 states that do not have the death penalty, murder rates are lower than the national average. (Illinois Coalition to Abolish The Death Penalty 1998) Since the re-instatement of the death penalty in 1976, 130 people have been exonerated for the crimes they were accused of committing. This has been accomplished with the advent of DNA testing, recanting of prior testimony and other useful means of investigation.
One early opponent of the death penalty, Cesare Becciria, an Italian jurist, who believed that the state does not have the right to take ones life for retribution of a crime. It was this thinking and dedication that led the Grand Duchy of Tuscany to become the first country in the world to abolish the death penalty. Many have followed in Cesare’s path. One such individual shocked the world when he made history with speeches made at Chicago’s DePaul University.
In January of 2003, the death penalty had it first true test of public scrutiny since 1976. Illinois Governor George Ryan pardoned 4 men who were tortured into giving false confessions to police about the crimes they were accused of. The torture included beatings, plastic bags placed over the heads of the subjects, electric wires used to shock the genitalia of some suspects, and other means of torture. The torture went on for sometimes 2 days in a row, until a confession was obtained. One suspect stated that he would have admitted to killing Jesus Christ, if they would just stop the torture. These false confessions caused innocent men to spend up to 15 years on Illinois’ death row.
The day after pardoning these four men, Gov. Ryan displayed his courage when he commuted the death sentences of 167 people on Illinois’ death row. 164 were commuted to life without parole and 3 were commuted to 40 years. In his action, Gov. Ryan stated “Our system is haunted by the demon of error.” (Sherrer) Governor Ryan went on to be nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize. Many saying that he was the most deserving public figure for the prize since Martin Luther King, Jr. (Sherrer)
But the fight did not stop there. Commissions were put in place all over the United States to review the policy on capital punishment. One major outcome of most of the commission’s reports to their states, was that the system is flawed and riddled with coerced confessions, inappropriate meting out of the death penalty, and unjust racial bias in the administration of capital punishment. Police brutality also was at the forefront of many arguments against the death penalty. It seems that police beatings were common throughout the nation.
More than 135 death penalty convictions in Illinois have been reversed or sentences vacated on appeal. The Chicago Tribune’s study of 285 capital cases between 1977-1999 found that 39 defendants had attorneys who were later disbarred or disciplined, 46 cases used jailhouse snitches, whose testimony is notoriously unreliable; 35 African American defendants were sentenced to death by all-white juries; and in 20 cases unreliable or fraudulent lab test results were used. (Illinois Coalition to Abolish The Death Penalty) This number is not acceptable to opponents and rightly so. Should innocent people be sitting in prison for crimes they did not commit? Or do we let the 100 guilty go free to save the one innocent person?
In researching this paper, I came across some of the people’s stories about being on death row in Illinois. One in particular hit me pretty good. It is the story of John Pecoraro. It briefly tells his story in one paragraph. It was not the story that got to me. It was the picture of him and his daughter that he has not seen in 6 years because of his situation. These are people that the government wants to execute, not animals. There serves no worldly purpose to executing someone other than to say “They will not get a chance to repeat their crime”. These people have children and families that still love and care for them. And are we supposed to throw all of that away because of a momentary lapse of better judgment? I am not willing to take that chance. John’s sentence of death was commuted to life without parole.
The families of these people on death row are going through just as much as those incarcerated are. Knowing your father, brother, mother, sister, whoever, will be executed at the hands of the state has to be unnerving. I cannot say I know how they feel, I do not. I do know that emotions run deep and it is evident when talking about the death penalty in Illinois. People in my community are becoming increasingly against the death penalty. I do not know if it because of Gov. Ryan’s courageous move or because people are finally realizing that the system in fundamentally flawed and cannot be perfected to a point that guarantees that no innocent person will die at the hands of the state’s murderers.
In Illinois there is a moratorium on executions. The action was ordered as a system filled with errors in applying the death penalty, was under worldwide scrutiny. A blue ribbon committee was impaneled to restructure the law governing capital punishment in Illinois. Even those charged with writing the new laws found it hard to write laws that prevented the innocent from facing the executioner’s needle. Joe Birkette, a leading death penalty proponent, was quoted as saying “The decline in death penalty convictions is a good thing, the death penalty should be used very rarely”. (Constable) The only fool-proof and moral option is to abolish the death penalty.
One challenge to abolishing the death penalty is defeating the myth that supporting the death penalty means you are tough on crime while opposing it makes you weak. Support for the death penalty has long been a key component of campaign literature for candidates portraying themselves as no-nonsense, law-and-order types. That stance simplistic and insulting to voters.
I have personally had the opportunity to interact with those on Illinois’ death row. I must say these guys are first and foremost, living, breathing human beings. Most are not the monsters that the media has portrayed them to be. The biggest misconception is that these guys live to kill. That is a fallacy and I am one that can attest to that. These are quiet, artistic, and for the most part normal. They have made a bad choice or two and realize that they have done wrong. Most are even remorseful and have apologized to the victim’s families. Seeing them in the paper or on television does them no justice. Seeing them in person, you can feel there is a personal side to these guys.
With what has been discovered in the last several years, my personal exposure to those under the sentence of death, and many, many people coming out against the death penalty, I have to position myself to be against capital punishment. This issue can be debated as long as the “which came first, chicken or the egg” debacle. I chose to protect life at any cost and whatever the cost is not too much to save an innocent person. Governments should not be in the murder business and the United States should join other civilized countries in banning the death penalty once and for all. It was Sir John Fortescue that said “I should, indeed, prefer twenty men to escape death through mercy, than one innocent to be condemned unjustly”.
Works Cited
Constable, Burt. "Time for state to join civilized world and end death penalty." Daily Herald 28 February 2008.
Court, United States Supreme. "People v Furman." 1972 .
Illinois Coalition to Abolish The Death Penalty. The Death Penalty Doesn't Work. Chicago: Illinois Coalition to Abolish The Death Penalty, 1998.
Sherrer, Hans. "Illinois Governor George Ryan Pardoned Four Innocent Men Condemned to Death On January 10, 2003, and the Next Day He Cleared Illinois’ Death Row." Justice Denied (2003).[/b]
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