Death Penalty Argument

Paper Summary:

This paper argues against the death penalty, noting that the death penalty has been a part of American law for a long time, removed completely only for a period of time after the U.S. Supreme Court ruled it was poorly conceived in the law in 1972, but many states rewrote their statutes and re-instituted the death penalty, often in response to public fears about violent crime. The death penalty is often raised as a solution during periods of high crime rates, though in fact evidence that the death penalty has any deterrent effect is at best mixed.

From the Paper:

"The people are demanding the death penalty as if it were a quick solution to a complex problem, when in fact it is no solution at all but merely a case of public revenge and scapegoating. It is scapegoating because the death of one prisoner comes to stand in for all the street crime in the nation, as if his or her death would..."

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