When or is the death penalty alright?

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Ender said:
CCC 2266:* The argument that we should not execute criminals because we might inadvertently execute an innocent person is only half of the question; the other half is how many innocent people will die if we don’t? In neither case is the answer zero. In fact, if the decision is to be made solely on the number of innocents killed then clearly it is better to execute more rather than fewer killers because many more people wrongfully die from killers released back to the streets than could possibly die from mistakenly executing the innocent.

Ender
*
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True but I think it overlooks the fact that we have the ability to keep prisoners locked up without parole who would otherwise be condemned. We also can keep violent prisoners separated from other prisoners so they can’t kill fellow inmates.

Do we have the will to do it, maybe not. I think some people who support the death penalty do so because they know that a life sentence many times isn’t.
 
Ender said:
CCC 2266:* “the primary scope of the penalty is to redress the disorder caused by the offense.”*

“Redress the disorder” is a phrase that means retribution, as Cardinal Dulles makes clear in his statement that:* “* 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.”

Aquinas explains the relationship between punishment and justice: “*the act of sin makes man deserving of punishment, in so far as he transgresses the order of Divine justice, to which he cannot return except he pay some sort of penal compensation, which restores him to the equality of justice”

*The argument that we should not execute criminals because we might inadvertently execute an innocent person is only half of the question; the other half is how many innocent people will die if we don’t? In neither case is the answer zero. In fact, if the decision is to be made solely on the number of innocents killed then clearly it is better to execute more rather than fewer killers because many more people wrongfully die from killers released back to the streets than could possibly die from mistakenly executing the innocent.

Ender
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Unacceptable. Before this argument can be made some kind of evidence is in order. Like lower murder rates in death penalty states, or victims killed by thise condemned of first degree murderers that were out on parole. Without data, you don’t have an argumement. You have a plea based on emotion.
 
momor said:
True but I think it overlooks the fact that we have the ability to keep prisoners locked up without parole who would otherwise be condemned. We also can keep violent prisoners separated from other prisoners so they can’t kill fellow inmates.

Do we have the will to do it, maybe not. I think some people who support the death penalty do so because they know that a life sentence many times isn’t.
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The question of whether we have the ability to keep violent prisoners separated from other prisoners is surely debatable (I certainly dispute that claim) but is rather beside the point which is: if the primary concern is the safety of the innocent then we should execute more rather than less because many more citizens will be saved from being murdered than will be executed for crimes they did not commit.

Ender
 
CWBetts said:
Unacceptable. Before this argument can be made some kind of evidence is in order. Like lower murder rates in death penalty states, or victims killed by thise condemned of first degree murderers that were out on parole. Without data, you don’t have an argumement. You have a plea based on emotion.
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I searched for this data before and it wasn’t easy to find but I’m willing to search for it again. Before I do, however, what will your position be if my claim turns out to be true? If the validity of my claim is irrelevant to you then it’s not worth my time trying to prove it.

Ender
 
Ender said:
I searched for this data before and it wasn’t easy to find but I’m willing to search for it again. Before I do, however, what will your position be if my claim turns out to be true? If the validity of my claim is irrelevant to you then it’s not worth my time trying to prove it.

Ender
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I will save you the effort. The statistics you find will not be in support of your position.
 
Recidivism rates for criminals tend to be rather high.

I do not know the percentages for committing a murder again after a murder, but I do know that in general it’s over 50% of released criminals who commit some crime again. You can find this on more than one government website.
 
Shin said:
Recidivism rates for criminals tend to be rather high.

I do not know the percentages for committing a murder again after a murder, but I do know that in general it’s over 50% of released criminals who commit some crime again. You can find this on more than one government website.
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general recidivism rates are irrelevant. If you argue that the death penalty must be enforced to stop repeat offenders, you must substantiate the claim that significant number of those incarcerated for 1st degree murder (the only murder charge that carries a death penalty, even Texas) upon being released do it again. I really do tire of the attitude of the ridiculous straw men arguments.
 
www.prodeathpenalty.com
has all the fiugures you may want, but be aware that “show me the evidence” is a red herring because for some, you could prove it and there will be no change because there is always some other excuse why it cant be accepted. Stick to the Church’s teaching and you wil be fine because there is plenty of history in support of the death penalty.

such as

firstthings.com/article/2007/01/gods-justice-and-ours-32

and (from Cardinal Dulles)

“The Catholic magisterium does not, and never has, advocated unqualified abolition of the death penalty. I know of no official statement from popes or bishops, whether in the past or in the present, that denies the right of the State to execute offenders at least in certain extreme cases. The United States bishops, in their majority statement on capital punishment, conceded that “Catholic teaching has accepted the principle that the State has the right to take the life of a person guilty of an extremely serious crime.” Joseph Cardinal Bernardin, in his famous speech on the “Consistent Ethic of Life” at Fordham in 1983, stated his concurrence with the “classical position” that the State has the right to inflict capital punishment.”

When it comes to bin Laden or Eichmann----exercise that right !!
 
CWBetts said:
I will save you the effort. The statistics you find will not be in support of your position.
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This evades my question: if the statistics show that many more people are murdered by people who have already killed once than there are innocent people executed by the state, would your position on the use of capital punishment change from opposition to support?

Ender
 
d97c said:
www.prodeathpenalty.com
has all the fiugures you may want, but be aware that “show me the evidence” is a red herring because for some, you could prove it and there will be no change because there is always some other excuse why it cant be accepted. Stick to the Church’s teaching and you wil be fine because there is plenty of history in support of the death penalty.

such as

firstthings.com/article/2007/01/gods-justice-and-ours-32

and (from Cardinal Dulles)

“The Catholic magisterium does not, and never has, advocated unqualified abolition of the death penalty. I know of no official statement from popes or bishops, whether in the past or in the present, that denies the right of the State to execute offenders at least in certain extreme cases. The United States bishops, in their majority statement on capital punishment, conceded that “Catholic teaching has accepted the principle that the State has the right to take the life of a person guilty of an extremely serious crime.” Joseph Cardinal Bernardin, in his famous speech on the “Consistent Ethic of Life” at Fordham in 1983, stated his concurrence with the “classical position” that the State has the right to inflict capital punishment.”

When it comes to bin Laden or Eichmann----exercise that right !!
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The first link is useless. It appears that I will have to give a crash course in source evaluation. Virtually all (bit not absolutely all) internet sources with the extension “.com” or “.net” are useless. Anyone with an agenda can get one, and the name of the first one says it all. The only evidence that will be presented will bu such that makes that taking of a criminal’s life to be no big deal. Websites with a “.org” website can be slightly better, but this depends largely on the organization. For example, I would trust a biography of Dr. Martin Luther King form the Nobel website, but not from Stormfront (both catty the “org” extension). What are left are the governmental web sites (.gov, .ca, .uk, etc) and educational institutions (.edu). Find someting in one of these latter two categories if you are going to convince me of anything.
 
Some people cant be “convinced” no matter what. No reason to waste time on those persons doing so. The “leading a horse to water” saying comes to mind. If one never learns anything from a .com site, one is limiting his or her knowedge. Suffice it to say that anyone who attacks a source simply because it is a “.com” site knows nothing about internet or teaching anything.
So…those who want to read something and not just listen to those who want to hear themselves talk, and assume anyone cares about their un-substantiated opinion, here we go-----

here’s a dot org site, as long as we are into that silliness…

cjlf.org/deathpenalty/KecklerLifeVDeath.pdf

and other sites…
roman-catholic.com/Roman/Articles/CapitalPunishment.htm

or
wesleylowe.com/cp.html

or

sites.google.com/site/yesdeathpenalty/home2

Read…the truth shall make you free !!!
 
d97c said:
Some people cant be “convinced” no matter what. No reason to waste time on those persons doing so. The “leading a horse to water” saying comes to mind. If one never learns anything from a .com site, one is limiting his or her knowedge. Suffice it to say that anyone who attacks a source simply because it is a “.com” site knows nothing about internet or teaching anything.
So…those who want to read something and not just listen to those who want to hear themselves talk, and assume anyone cares about their un-substantiated opinion, here we go-----

here’s a dot org site, as long as we are into that silliness…

cjlf.org/deathpenalty/KecklerLifeVDeath.pdf

and other sites…
roman-catholic.com/Roman/Articles/CapitalPunishment.htm

or
wesleylowe.com/cp.html

or

sites.google.com/site/yesdeathpenalty/home2

Read…the truth shall make you free !!!
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And nothing from the USDOJ that shows that the death penalty actually reduces crime. Why am I not surprised>
 
CWBetts said:
The first link is useless. It appears that I will have to give a crash course in source evaluation. Virtually all (bit not absolutely all) internet sources with the extension “.com” or “.net” are useless. Anyone with an agenda can get one, and the name of the first one says it all. The only evidence that will be presented will bu such that makes that taking of a criminal’s life to be no big deal. Websites with a “.org” website can be slightly better, but this depends largely on the organization. For example, I would trust a biography of Dr. Martin Luther King form the Nobel website, but not from Stormfront (both catty the “org” extension). What are left are the governmental web sites (.gov, .ca, .uk, etc) and educational institutions (.edu). Find someting in one of these latter two categories if you are going to convince me of anything.
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You mean like Catholic.com? 🙂
 
Ender said:
The question of whether we have the ability to keep violent prisoners separated from other prisoners is surely debatable (I certainly dispute that claim) but is rather beside the point which is: if the primary concern is the safety of the innocent then we should execute more rather than less because many more citizens will be saved from being murdered than will be executed for crimes they did not commit.

Ender
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It is not beside the point, it really is the point as John Paul II and the Catechism teach.
 
diggerdomer said:
It is not beside the point, it really is the point as John Paul II and the Catechism teach.
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One of the major problems with 2267 is that it puts the defense of society as the highest aim of punishment and it makes the assumption that executions are not necessary to protect the public. If it turns out, however, that the public is better protected by executing more killers then 2267 becomes an argument in favor of the death penalty.

Besides, the particular point being discussed was whether there would be more innocent people murdered by recidivist killers or wrongly executed by the state. This goes to the validity of the argument that we should not execute anyone because an innocent person might be executed and my rebuttal that more innocent people will die when there are fewer executions. JPII’s statement has no bearing on which position is correct.

Ender
 
Ender said:
One of the major problems with 2267 is that it puts the defense of society as the highest aim of punishment and it makes the assumption that executions are not necessary to protect the public. If it turns out, however, that the public is better protected by executing more killers then 2267 becomes an argument in favor of the death penalty.

Besides, the particular point being discussed was whether there would be more innocent people murdered by recidivist killers or wrongly executed by the state. This goes to the validity of the argument that we should not execute anyone because an innocent person might be executed and my rebuttal that more innocent people will die when there are fewer executions. JPII’s statement has no bearing on which position is correct.

Ender
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And you have not provided any statistics to prove your point. If a person is eligible for the death penalty but the jury instead decides on life without parole, those people are not getting out of prison to kill again anyway. Has it happened? Yes, but rarely.and not all of those people necessarily kill again.
 
momor said:
And you have not provided any statistics to prove your point. If a person is eligible for the death penalty but the jury instead decides on life without parole, those people are not getting out of prison to kill again anyway. Has it happened? Yes, but rarely.and not all of those people necessarily kill again.
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If the statistics are irrelevant to you (and CWBetts) then there is no point in my trying to find them; it would just be a waste of my time. I will ask you the same question: if the statistics showed that on net more innocent people were saved by increasing the execution of murderers, would that change your opinion on the use of the death penalty? And if not, why not?

Ender
 
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