The Death Penalty

[Texas_Roofer]

Yes, I am against the death penalty (Capital Punishment CP). Once I was for CP however I see no evidence CP has been successful and plenty of evidence it has been a sin see deathpenaltyinfo.org/article.php?scid=45&did=292

1)Killing teaches Killing

2)All killings have many unanticipated consequences

3)Capital punishment is more expensive than life in prison(!) over 3:1 and we get to add the potential of being eternally damn for participating! Not exactly the deal I am looking for.

 

[levi86]

First of all, retribution is the primary justification for the use of punishment. (2266: Punishment has the primary aim of redressing the disorder introduced by the offense.)

2266 The efforts of the state to curb the spread of behavior harmful to people’s rights and to the basic rules of civil society correspond to the requirement of safeguarding the common good. Legitimate public authority has the right and duty to inflict punishment proportionate to the gravity of the offense. Punishment has the primary aim of redressing the disorder introduced by the offense. When it is willingly accepted by the guilty party, it assumes the value of expiation. Punishment then, in addition to defending public order and protecting people’s safety, has a medicinal purpose: as far as possible, it must contribute to the correction of the guilty party.

How were you able interpret CCC 2266 this way??? 2266 clearly states that the primary purpose of punishment is to “redress the disorder introduced by the offence”, why would you assume this refers to retribution? Besides retribution capital punishment has a number of effects, deterrence, rehabilitation, incapacitation and restoration, all of which are intended to “redress” the impact of the crime. 2266 most certainly does not state that retribution is the “primary justification for the use of punishment”

Second, the state has “the right and duty to inflict punishment proportionate to the gravity of the offense.” (2266) Note that it has not just the right but the responsibility of inflicting not merely punishment but punishment that is proportional to the crime.

To use proportionate punishment does not at all suggest that the purpose of that punishment is of a retributive nature. For example, a deterance based punishment of murder would need to be more severe than one of shoplifting.

The statements of 2266 highlight the weakness of 2267 which claims that the only valid reason for using the death penalty is to protect society. This claim is based on the tertiary purpose of punishment (protection) and ignores the primary purpose of redressing the disorder. It is properly a question of justice, not of safety.

Don’t you think it is somewhat presumptuous to suggest that the authors of the catechism have erred? When you read 2266 in its proper context you will see that 2266 and 2267 are in perfect harmony.

 

[apricot_yogurt]

I write to someone on death row. I know what he did. The death penalty denys him the chance to reform himself, and become a decent member of society-in fact-since he is facing the death penalty why should he make any effort to reform-he might as well remain bitter and angry.
Will his death bring back his victim? Nope. It will simply increase the pain. It will break another families heart (and mine). It will make his family angry I’m sure.
It is one thing to murder someone in the heat of the moment under drugs or alcohol, and quite another to murder someone deliberately and calculatedly in the name of justice.
My friend lives in a 9x6’ concrete cell-his bed is made of concrete even. Should he be punished?-yep. Should he be murdered because murder is bad?Makes no sense.

 

[Ender]

2266 clearly states that the primary purpose of punishment is to “redress the disorder introduced by the offence”, why would you assume this refers to retribution?

Perhaps you misunderstand the definition of retribution. According to Webster it means “something given or exacted in recompense (especially punishment).” As Cardinal Dulles explained in a 2001 article on the death penalty: “Punishment is held to have a variety of ends that may conveniently be reduced to the following four: rehabilitation, defense against the criminal, deterrence, and retribution.” Even the USCCB said as much in 1980: “The three justifications traditionally advanced for punishment in general are retribution, deterrence, and reform.”

Besides retribution capital punishment has a number of effects, deterrence, rehabilitation, incapacitation and restoration, all of which are intended to “redress” the impact of the crime.

Deterrence, rehabilitation, and incapacitation all work to lessen the likelihood of future crimes; they do nothing to redress the harm caused by a crime already committed.

2266 most certainly does not state that retribution is the “primary justification for the use of punishment”

It says: “Punishment has the primary aim of redressing the disorder introduced by the offense.” As the USCCB statement explains: “The third [3rd on their list, not 3rd in importance] justifying purpose for punishment is retribution or the restoration of the order of justice which has been violated by the action of the criminal.”

Don’t you think it is somewhat presumptuous to suggest that the authors of the catechism have erred?

It would certainly seem so, but beyond 2267 there is virtually nothing in Church tradition to support your position or oppose mine.

When you read 2266 in its proper context you will see that 2266 and 2267 are in perfect harmony.

There is nothing whatever in 2267 that addresses the primary justification for punishment, which is retribution. The question of justice is ignored.

Ender

 

[levi86]

Perhaps you misunderstand the definition of retribution. According to Webster it means “something given or exacted in recompense (especially punishment).”

That’s what happens when you use an English dictionary written by an American. Heres what The Oxford dictionary has to say…

retribution

/retribyoosh’n/

• noun punishment inflicted in the spirit of moral outrage or personal vengeance.

— DERIVATIVES retributive /ritribyootiv/ adjective retributory /ritribyoot ri/ adjective.

— ORIGIN Latin, from retribuere ‘assign again’.

Deterrence, rehabilitation, and incapacitation all work to lessen the likelihood of future crimes; they do nothing to redress the harm caused by a crime already committed.

So how does putting someone to death redress the harm caused by a crime, aside from satisfying the blood lust of those concerned?

 

[Ender]

It is one thing to murder someone in the heat of the moment under drugs or alcohol, and quite another to murder someone deliberately and calculatedly in the name of justice.

The execution of a criminal by the state, whatever it may be, is not murder and has never been defined so by the Church. You need to find an argument that doesn’t involve distorting the common meaning of words.

Ender

 

[dudleysharp]

Today, in fact, as a consequence of the possibilities which the state has for effectively preventing crime, by rendering one who has committed an offense incapable of doing harm - without definitely taking away from him the possibility of redeeming himself - the cases in which the execution of the offender is an absolute necessity "are very rare, if not practically nonexistent."

This is simply false.

This church teaching is a call to spare murderers lives at the cost of sacrificing more innocents, Murderers murder and harm, again, way too often.

In addition, this Church teaching, inexplicably, duplicates PJP II’s obvious errors.

Pope John Paul II made serious errors in fact and logic within his anti death penalty writings. In addition he overlooked the many biblical, theological and traditional Church teachings on the death penalty - such teachings overwhelm his inaccurate writings on the death penalty.

PJP II based his writings on defense of society, which is a penological consideration, not a religious one. By doing so he omitted justice. More importantly, he avoided the reality that the death penalty is a greater defense of society than lesser sentences and in by so doing, he has called for the sparing of guilty lives by the sacrifice of more innocents.

We all know that living murderers, in prison, after escape or after our failures to incarcerate them, are much more likely to harm and murder, again, than are executed murderers.

No knowledgeable party questions that the death penalty has the most extensive due process protections in US criminal law. Therefore, it is logically conclusive, that actual innocents are more likely to be sentenced to life imprisonment and more likely to die in prison serving under that sentence, that it is that an actual innocent will be executed.

Thirdly, 10 recent studies find for death penalty deterrence. Some believe that all studies with contrary findings negate those 10 studies. They don’t. Studies which don’t find for deterrence don’t say no one is deterred, but that they cannot measure those deterred, if they are.

Ask yourself: “What prospect of a negative outcome doesn’t deter some?” There isn’t one, although committed anti death penalty folk may say the death penalty is the only one. However, the premier anti death penalty scholar accepts it as a given that the death penalty is a deterrent, but does not believe it to be a greater deterrent than a life sentence. I find the evidence compelling that death is feared more than life - even in prison.

In choosing to end the death penalty, or in choosing not implement it, some have chosen to put more innocents at risk.

Furthermore, possibly we have sentenced 20-25 actually innocent people to death since 1973, or 0.3% of those so sentenced. Those have been released upon post conviction review.

 

[dudleysharp]

Yes, I am against the death penalty (Capital Punishment CP).
1)Killing teaches Killing

2)All killings have many unanticipated consequences

3)Capital punishment is more expensive than life in prison(!) over 3:1 and we get to add the potential of being eternally damn for participating! Not exactly the deal I am looking for.

If executions teach murder (which they don’t) do you believe that legal incarceration teaches kidnapping or that fines teach robbery?

Not all, but some killings, have unintended consequences. But, it is important to distinguish between killings, isn’t it? There are moral differences between child rape/murder, self defense killings, just war killings and the execution of those who rape and murder children.

There is certainly no need for capital punishment to be more expensive than a life sentence.
*

1. All cost studies exclude the cost of geriatric care, recently found to be $69,000/inmate/yr. A significant omission from life sentence costs.

1. All studies exclude the cost savings of the death penalty, which is the ONLY sentence which allows for a plea bargain to a maximum life sentence. Depending upon jurisdiction, this may result in a zero net cost for the death penalty, depending on the number of plea bargains Vs the number of death penalty trials, or an actual net cost benefit to the state.

1. The Duke University-North Carolina death penalty cost study provides an instructive lesson

Anti death penalty folks have been deceptively stating that it costs* $2.16 million for an execution in North Carolina. However, what the study really says is that $2.16 million is the average cost of execution, for all death penalty cases.* For example, if 10 people are sentenced to death and only one of* those ten is executed and you roll all of the costs for all of those 10 death penalty cases into that 1 execution, you would get an average* cost of $2.16 million per execution.
*
You could dishonestly do the same thing with LWOP. As soon your first LWOP prisoner died, you could roll all of the LWOP costs, from all other living LWOP cases, and say that it cost $20 million on average per LWOP. That would be equally inaccurate and misleading.
*
In reality (read the Executive Summary) the difference in cost between a North Carolina murder conviction with a “life” sentence* and a death sentence is $163,000. See also paragraph 9 Summing up, page 2.(2)
*
But in the study, a life sentence is only 20 years. You need to add 20-30 years – or $500,000 - $750,000/prisoner --* to get a real life sentence. The authors also concede leaving out geriatric care, recently found to be $69,000/yr/prisoner.
*
In other words, what the study actually tells us is that an actual life sentence costs much more than a death sentence.

5)* FCC economist Dr. Paul Zimmerman finds that executions result in a huge cost benefit to society. "Specifically, it is estimated that each state execution deters somewhere between 3 and 25 murders per year (14 being the average). Assuming that the value of human life is approximately $5 million (1)
*
That is a cost benefit of $70 million per execution.* 9 additional, recent studies support the deterrent effect. Deterrence report upon request.
*
We know that living murderers are infinitely more likely to harm and murder, again, than are executed murderers. There is no doubt that executions do save innocent lives. What value do you put on the lives saved? Certainly not less than $5 million.
*
While costs can be higher, sometimes much higher, with capital punishment than with life without parole, it isn’t required, States need only improve upon the examples of those states which have the most efficient death penalty systems.
*
The bottom line is that states can have a just death penalty system and not spend more than they currently do on life without parole cases.*
*
It just takes the will of the legislature and the judges.
*
1). “State Executions, Deterrence and the Incidence of Murder”, Paul R. Zimmerman* (zimmy@att.net),** March 3. 2003, Social Science Research Network
2) www-pps(DOT)aas.duke.edu/people/faculty/cook/comnc.pdf
*
copyright 2004-2007
*
Dudley Sharp, Justice Matters