Death penalty Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2000 words

Death penalty - Essay Example Advocates consider it a fair and just punishment and neither cruel nor unusual, quite the opposite; they consider it a fair and ethical punishment. This paper discusses why society feels the need to punish along with the legal, logical, and moral implications of the death penalty. This subject is literally of life and death importance and a major barometer for establishing the collective conscience of the American culture which is behind its European cousins on this as well as other moral and ethical issues such as health care, drug laws, education and gun control. Punishment Why We Punish Historically, the justification for punishing lawbreakers has been to â€Å"avenge the crime, to protect society by imprisoning the criminal, to deter that person and other potential offenders from the commission of crimes and to obtain reparations from the offender† (Wolfgang, 1998). Throughout recorded history, this reasoning has not changed much. The four main reasons the justice system p unishes criminals can be categorized by two main rationales. One is to obtain desired results which are deterrence, protecting society and seeking compensation. The other, retribution, involves punishing for crimes committed on humanity. Retribution is simply a fancy word for revenge. The need for revenge is one of the lowest forms of human emotion, a condition that is understandable in many circumstances,  but is not a rational response to a serious situation. â€Å"To kill the person who has killed someone close to you is simply to continue the cycle of violence  which ultimately destroys the  avenger as well as the offender. That this  execution somehow give 'closure'  to a tragedy is a myth.† (Schroth, 2008) Justifying Death Those who think that vengeance is a justification for continuing the death penalty usually point out the Old Testament reference of ‘an eye for an eye.’ Aggressive behavior must be met with equally aggressive forms of punishment . Interestingly, people who quote this Biblical passage to justify their position of using the death penalty is either intentionally ignoring or never read one of the most popular quotes in the Gospels of the New Testament. Jesus recalls the ‘eye for an eye’ reference and clearly rejects the statement before asking his gathered followers to ‘turn the other cheek’ instead. On the weight of that quote alone, all Christians should be strongly against the death penalty. However, the ‘eye for an eye’ excuse is still widely employed by people today. Those who adopt this viewpoint are certainly correct when they say that using the death penalty guarantees that the convicted murderer will not kill again. Additionally, the death penalty is the ultimate preventative measure. Persons opposed to capital punishment consider all life to be sacred and should be respected. Putting a murderer in prison for life with no possibility of parole is adequate punishme nt, is less expensive and achieves the desired result of segregating the person from society, forever, the same as the death penalty. By any religious or philosophical interpretation, legalized revenge is wrong and in the end more destructive to the fabric of society and its value system than was the crime itself. The decision to impose the death sentence is more of a cultural difference than one based on religious beliefs. Christians in America are generally in favor of the death penalty while their