Harumi

Also, since we're into the emotional argument, I have yet to see a sound decision made when emotions are high.

That's another problem I have with the justice system. The average American can't tell a p from a q in a logical argument. Instead, most people in the jury will probably be swayed by emotional arguments that cater to the whims of our feelings, regardless of the truth of the matter.

It's all about sensationalism, and to let people decide the life of a man who can be possibly innocent because of sensationalism and "a bright, rhetorical, convincing" argument is not justice either.

Primal

Most objections to the death penalty are really just value judgements i.e. "its barbaric".

What it really comes down to though is whether not you agree with retribution theory and whether or not you agree that matching the punishment with the crime is just retribution.

First off, retribution theory basically means that if someone acts in a criminal manner, i.e. initiates a wrong, it is now just or moral to react in a way as to punish that person. i.e. an action that if initiated would be immoral, can be considered moral if it is used as a response.

Now people can disagree with retribution theory, but then I have seen no solid basis for punishment. One is that we punish to prevent, however this seems somewhat weak.

Lets take former Nazi officers who oversaw the genocide of jews. How likely is it they will do this again? Very, very unlikely. So unlikely as to consider such an act near impossible. Now will punishing them deter future genocide? Unlikely as well. I really doubt a dictator will say to himself "I might be caught and hurt if I do this....so I better not." So does that mean we let them get off scott free?


Or lets say, a man brutally rapes and murders a young woman, lets say you *know* he won't do it again. Do we just let the man go now? Would that really be just?

Also it can be argued "two wrongs don't make a right", if we take out retribution theory, then isn't locking up, say a kidnapper, just as wrong as kidnapping them...even if its to prevent further kidnapping? I mean you are then kidnapping a person in order to prevent further kidnappings.....


Secondly, lets take the idea of proportion.
Many who adhere to retribution theory think a just or fair punishment is "an eye for an eye." So to speak, or the punishment should fit the severity of the crime approximately. As much as we can possibly fit it that is.


Now many can disagree with this, but then what scale do we use? The punishment more then the crime? The punishment below the crime?

Or in the case of those who only agree with prevention, punishment enough to deter the crime?

In which case can it be argued that we should execute people who violate traffic safety laws? I mean, such an action would work as a wonderful deterant I imagine. Such an action would certainly prevent traffic violations. But most of us would consider such an act unjust...but why? If justice=prevention then it seems the act *IS* just.


Thus given retribution theory, and the idea of approximate/equal punishment, it seems the death penalty is warranted.

Because it is retribution and it is equal to the crime i.e. losing a life for taking a life. Life in prison is not an equal punishment as the murderer still gets to keep his or her life though the victim lost theirs.

Now the most serious objections stems from a matter of prudence, as I see it, not the nature of justice. It is the matter of innocent people being executed.

Now your decision on this matter will be purely that of a value judgement.

i.e.

Avoiding some wrongful executions

vs

Attaining justice in the most henious of crimes.


I go for the latter for the following reasons:

1) I think matters of a heinous criminal avoiding justice will be more common then a person being wrongfully executed if we opt for the former.

2) I think both unfortunate outcomes as equally severe, a murderer not facing justice to me is just as bad as someone innocent being executed.

3) Our methods of detecting the actual criminals are improving as science advances.


Notice though the issue does not have to be so clean cut. The government could for example allow for the death penalty to be used in the most clean cut cases but not allow it to be used in questionable cases pending further evidence.

This would make the chances of an innocent person recieving the death penalty so small as to be ignored.

Now what is this all ultimately based on? A value judgement and some notions of utlity/simpicity in regards to how justice is done.

However so is the case made by the opposition.

In essence they are saying "Nay" I am saying "yay" plus pointing to difficulties/complexities for the opposition.

Walross

A well written post, Primal, though I disagree with much of your conclusion. Unfortunately I don't have much time to post right now, but I just have to address one of your points:

...you realize, of course, that if an innocent is executed for murder, then the real murderer will very likely never face justice for that crime? In that case, you have two great wrongs - an innocent executed and a murderer escaping justice. If, in your opinion, an innocent being executed is equally as bad as a murderer not facing justice, wouldn't the severity of both added together outweigh the importance of either one alone?

exile

Walross

It has to be pointed out that if the supposed murderer is jailed rather than executed the real murderer will still escape justice.

The persuasive argument for me is that IF evidence comes out later on and the conviction is overturned, you can at least make some attempt to compensate the wrongfully convicted man if he has been jailed wrongly. You can't compensate a corpse.

One could extend this argument and say that no-one should be jailed, in case we convict the wrong man. However in this case Primal's argument comes into play: if we have a society in which no-one is jailed or punished then the consequence would be anarchy, or rule by groups like the Mafia; in which case we as citizens have to accept the chance of being jailed for something we didn't do as part of the fee (like taxes and the draft) for living in an advanced society.

Jamie_L

Primal:

I think you are leaving out an important element to punishment of criminals: Preserving social order and protecting law-abiding citizens.

Prevention through deterent, which you do mention, is part of this equation. However, it is not the whole equation. Also involved is prevention through restricting the freedom of criminals: i.e., an imprisoned or executed criminal does not threaten the general public.

While some objections to the death penalty are value judgements about it being "barbaric", I think few have made such an arguement here. Ultimately, any position is a "value judgement", and in my case, I judge preserving social order and protecting citizens to be the most important mission of the justice system. As a believer in Constitutional rights and individual freedoms, I believe another important consideration is that the justice system must preserve the rights of the citizens it protects. Most important of these rights is the right to life.

So, again, I restate my arguement: the death penalty (DP) is no more effective at maintaining social order than life without parole (LWOP). Since LWOP is infinitely superior at protecting the right to life of innocent citizens, I say LWOP is preferable to the DP.

The notion that punishment does not deter seems in error. Clearly the threat of a speeding ticket deters some people from speeding. Note the great increase in speed-related traffic accidents in Montana after they eliminated their interstate speed limit. At certain extremes, it is true that punishment may no longer deter. An emotionally enraged person will not think about punishment. A person who thinks they are clever enough not to get caught also won't think about punishment. However, such people may need to be locked up to get them off the streets. Again, we are back to the broad equation of social order. Punishment creates a framework that in general deters people from believing they can do whatever they want, as long as they have the might to pull it off. In specific cases it may seem less logical, but the general framework still does it's job.


In my mind, attaining "justice" is a difficult goal. The difference in "justice" between a man being executed and a man being in prison until he dies is minimal. Furthermore, option 1, as mentioned, also involves a miscarriage of justice. Someone is not punished for a heinous crime - at all. AND an innocent is stipped of his most fundamental right by his government.

Again, how big of a miscarriage of justice is it for a murderer to rot in a cell until he dies than for him to die 30 years sooner? Compare this to taking a law-abiding citizen and killing them. Overall, it seems to me that killing an innocent is far more of an injustice than letting hundreds of murderers rot in jail. So, even though more murderers will "live" in prison, that doesn't mean the scale tips in their direction.

Do you believe police should be able to break down your door in the middle of the night to do a random house search - not on any kind of suspiscion, but just because your address was spit out of a computer? Because such a system would allow many more criminals to be brought to justice. Kidnappers. Drug dealers. Terrorists. Police should be able to search any house for any reason, or even for no reason. Right?

Well, in the U.S., we say no. We say the rights of law-abiding citizens are, in some cases, more important that bringing criminals to justice. It is the same in the case of executions. In a country that places emphasis of freedoms and rights, the right to life of the wrongly-convicted should be weighted more heavily than the importance of making sure some criminals die in prison sooner than they otherwise would.

Evidence is collected by humans. Labs are run by humans. Some crimes will never have that kind of evidence. And lawyers are good at their jobs. Prosecutors have political pressures. Juries are crafted by attourneys and they are human as well. The process will always be open not only to error but to abuse as well. Yes, wrongful executions will go down as technology improves, but they will never go away - unless there are no executions.

And as I've said, there's no real loss to public safety if executions go away. That's born out clearly in statistics of states and countries with no death penalty.

What does "clean cut" mean? Who decides? Do we trust government officials to make these kind of life-and-death decisions? Hell, I don't even trust them to spend my taxes.

At the risk of making an emotional arguement: would you ignore it if it was someone you cared for? Or you?

Yes, it's a value judgement. But, when I try to be logical about it, it just seems to me that the costs of the DP far outweigh the benefits. LWOP seems to have few costs to me, but many benefits. What most concerns me is protecting the public, and specifically, the people I care about. The DP provides an additional threat to them, with no significant benefit to them.

Jamie

fishbulb

Primal:

You can't just assume that punishing offenders is inherently right and then run around looking for justification for that assumption. If punishment for retribution is wrong, and there is no basis for punishing people other than for retribution, the correct conclusion is that there is, in fact, no basis for punishment.

But I disagree with that assesment. Parents punish their children when they do something dangerous, inconsiderate, or inappropriate. Often, the situation can be resolved simply by talking to the child, avoiding the need to punish altogether. The purpose of this punishment, if they are good parents, is to correct the behaviour of the child. Obviously, corner time isn't always going to work on an adult who has committed violent assault, but the principle remains the same: take firm but compassionate measures to change a person's behaviour.

Second, there are times when it is prudent to place restrictions on an individual's freedom, for his own safety and, more importantly, for the safety of the rest of the community. Various forms of custody and judicial supervision can be used to control and monitor someone who is likely to pose a continued threat to the community.

Third, there is restitution. It is quite reasonable for a community to demand that someone who has damaged part of the community be responsible for putting things back together. This is often not possible, as there is no direct form of restitution that can make up for serious violent crimes and certain other offenses, but it is possible to at least salvage something from a tragedy, if both the offender and the community are willing to put aside notions of vengeance and a "one strike and you're out" mentality.


Personal feelings do not consitute valid arguments on matters of public policy. Can you explain why you think failing to execute a murderer is as heinous and reprehensible as allowing, say, yourself, to be put through the horrors of living on death row for years, going through the agony of the appeals process, and finally dying in a room full of people who are convinced you are the antichrist, even though you did nothing?

The innocence issue is an important one; innocent people get convicted all the time, and it is dishonest to pretend that they don't. But it is really secondary to the whole question of whether execution is an appropriate tool at all. I say that it is not, because it's one benefit: to make some people temporarily feel better is hardly worth the costs, not least of which is the tremendous devaluation of human life it promotes. In fact, if it would reduce the levels of crime and violence in my community, I wouldn't care if you sentenced murderers to a 3-day spa treatment and a week in Hawaii.

Who cares if people avoid justice? All "justice" in this sense means is hurting people you think deserve to be hurt. I can see how that might be important to a five year old, but there are good reasons we don't let five year olds make public policy.

Walross

Hi macaskil,

You wrote:

That's true, but an innocent serving a life term in jail has a vested interest in keeping the case alive via appeals, private investigations, etc. There is always the chance (which admittedly could be small depending on the circumstances) that the conviction will be overturned, and the search for the real murderer resumed. If the innocent is executed, the chances of this are much smaller.

In any case, my point was that many supporters of the death penalty dismiss the "innocents could be killed" argument by saying that this is an acceptable price to pay to make sure murderers get justice. They never seem to address the fact that, generally (though there could be exceptions), for every innocent executed, a murderer escapes justice. So the price is not "just" an innocent person killed - it is that plus a killer walking free.

I agree with you fully – it is the irrevocability of the death penalty, combined with the fallibility of humans that makes me think it unwise.

I am, of course, not advocating the abolition of jail terms for those convicted of crimes. Regards,

Walross

Misso

I am completely against death penalty.
I believe that there are some fundamental and inalienable rights, which includes the right of life, so I don't believe that anyone has the right to take a life. Not one person, not one hundred persons, and not a government.

Deathpenalty is murder (which, for me, is the taking of a life against the wishes of the "owner" of that life) approved by a certain group of people. What, in this, is different from a murder in a family where five members of the family say that one member should die and one says that that member shouldn't die? There is only a difference in scale. Yet one is classed as murder and another as retribution, or penalty. How is a murder commited by one group (a government - one that doesn't even always have the majority of the people behind it) acceptable, when a murder commited by another group, or individual, is not?

To me, for this reason alone, even in a system that makes not a single mistake, deathpenalty is unacceptable.

Valmorian

Well said! And welcome to the II boards..

Primal

Excellent point, and I concede given that situation(the real murderer has a greater chance of going free) then yes, executing an innocent is more severe. However I would still support the death penalty because more often I feel the guilty would get an unjust pinishment, also the criminal can likewise go free if someone is falsely accused and gets life in prison.