There are several reasons to argue for making the death penalty illegal in the United States of America. The United States Constitution does not allow for unkind penalties as a sentence for crime. The death penalty poses many risks to the innocent. World opinion supports the cessation of the death penalty. Poor and minorities suffer disproportionately from the death penalty. Capital punishment is not a deterrent to crime. Putting people to death by capital punishment is not cost effective. Putting people to death by capital punishment is inhumane and should be illegal. The U.S. Constitution states that, “cruel and unusual punishments (Amendment 8, 1791),” should not be inflicted on its citizens. It is especially cruel in
No white juveniles have been sentenced to death row in Texas since the death penalty was reinstated in 1982. Since capital punishment does not deter criminal offenses, it should not be a legal form of punishment. A study by The New York Times in 2000 found that homicide rates had risen and fallen along roughly symmetrical paths in the states with and without the death penalty. The neighboring states of Michigan, with no death penalty, and Indiana, which regularly imposes death sentences and carries out executions, have had virtually indistinguishable homicide rates. “In 2007 the murder rate in Michigan was 676 (1.76%) with a 10 million population” (disastercenter.com). While the murder rate in Indiana for the same period was “356 (1.4%) with a population of 6.3 million” people (disastercenter.com). An analysis of the murder rate in Virginia second behind Texas in number of executions from 1976-2004 (94/944) and neighboring Maryland show no significant difference. In 2007 the murder rate in Virginia was “406 with a 7.7 million population” (fbi.gov) and in Maryland for the same period it was “553 with a population of 5.6 million people” (fbi.gov). It is also pertinent to compare states with high and low rates of execution as a result of the death penalty. A good comparison for this