2008 Woodie Awards
Is Capital Punishment Justice?
Carmela Amador
Issue date: 10/1/03 Section: Opinion
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Some of the laws that govern our country today date back to the earliest recorded time. The logic before laws came into play was, an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth. Even murder was, you kill someone, then you in turn are killed. The simplicity of this reasoning is apparent, but the logic is inhumane and ignorant.
Laws such as the death penalty date back to 18 century B.C. and are still being carried out and debated to date. The logic behind the death penalty is to teach a lesson, to punish, hence the term capital punishment. It’s the big kahuna of punishment. A murder is defined as an unlawful killing of another human. When a murder is committed, the courts in turn take the life of the criminal. So you kill someone, we kill you.
Get it?
Does this sound a bit barbaric?
Maybe bouncing around a couple of those Christian morals?
There was this little bit in Eighth Amendment under capital punishment that states, “Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted.”
Funny how killing a criminal doesn’t fall under that whole ‘cruel’ part.
In 1972, the landmark Furman decision concluded that a punishment would be ‘cruel and unusual’ if it was too severe for the crime or offended society’s sense of justice. But is justice killing a man for his crime of murder and believing that it taught society to not take a life?
In 1958, the Supreme Court decided in Trop v. Dulles that the death penalty was used so much and so many people supported it, why should it be illegal? Granted, the Eighth Amendment is subject to interpretation, so they interpreted it to be, if everyone does it it’s not illegal, right? They did say that the Eighth Amendment contained an “evolving standard of decency that marked the progress of a maturing society”.
One would think that our society has evolved to the degree that our laws to preserve human life would be more flexible than an eye for an eye, but no, just more liberal.
Laws such as the death penalty date back to 18 century B.C. and are still being carried out and debated to date. The logic behind the death penalty is to teach a lesson, to punish, hence the term capital punishment. It’s the big kahuna of punishment. A murder is defined as an unlawful killing of another human. When a murder is committed, the courts in turn take the life of the criminal. So you kill someone, we kill you.
Get it?
Does this sound a bit barbaric?
Maybe bouncing around a couple of those Christian morals?
There was this little bit in Eighth Amendment under capital punishment that states, “Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted.”
Funny how killing a criminal doesn’t fall under that whole ‘cruel’ part.
In 1972, the landmark Furman decision concluded that a punishment would be ‘cruel and unusual’ if it was too severe for the crime or offended society’s sense of justice. But is justice killing a man for his crime of murder and believing that it taught society to not take a life?
In 1958, the Supreme Court decided in Trop v. Dulles that the death penalty was used so much and so many people supported it, why should it be illegal? Granted, the Eighth Amendment is subject to interpretation, so they interpreted it to be, if everyone does it it’s not illegal, right? They did say that the Eighth Amendment contained an “evolving standard of decency that marked the progress of a maturing society”.
One would think that our society has evolved to the degree that our laws to preserve human life would be more flexible than an eye for an eye, but no, just more liberal.