A point of interest that must be addressed when speaking of capital punishment is the situation that is currently taking place in Illinoi

Studies have shown that in Britain, after 1972, abolished the death penalty, the chance of being murdered in Britain has not increased (Tobias 44). Former associate justice of the US supreme court Abe Fortas says, “The death penalty, as we use it, exerts no influence on the extent or rate of capital offenses (Fortas 9).” In a study done in New York City, one sees that since the death penalty was reinstated in New York almost four years ago, the plunge in murder rates that began before the death penalty was enacted has continued (Tabak 26).

s. Governor George Ryan imposed a moratorium (freeze/hold) on the state's death penalty. All lethal injections will be postponed indefinitely pending an investigation into why more executions have been overturned than carried out since 1977, when Illinois reinstated capital punishment. The Republican governor will create a special panel to study the state's capital punishment system in general and determine what happened in the 13 specific cases in which men were wrongly convicted. “We have now freed more people than we have put to death under our system - 13 people have been exonerated and 12 have been put to death,” Ryan says. “There is a flaw in the system, without question, and it needs to be studied.”

The death penalty is cruel and immoral. No murder is as cold-blooded as legal execution. No one should be subjected to the horrible pain of prolonged waiting (sometimes for years) to be killed by his own society. The death penalty is also immoral and basically shows our country a constant example of violence as being right. Most major religions are also strongly opposed to capital punishment. One can’t imagine how sickening it must feel to be locked up in a cell for years just knowing that once freed from confinement, execution is next. Some believe that the death penalty is acceptable today because our country no longer uses “cruel and unusual” ways to execute its victims. Being locked up for years and then only being let out to be killed is cruel no matter what way it is viewed.

Public support for capital punishment is much stronger than is for its abolition (Siegel 124). American society has always been criticized for being overly violent and morally corrupt in some ways. In a disturbing event that happened in San Quentin Prison in California, one can see the way Americans view violence. The warden for the prison gave out a phone number in a newspaper ad. The ad stated that 50 people were invited to witness a gas chamber execution live at the prison. Within one day of the printing, over 500 requests came in (McCarthy 4C). Incidents like this lead some to believe that support for the death penalty will continue because so many people do not look at other alternatives of punishment. It seems that the outcry of the public may be like the title of that Metallica album, ‘kill em all’. This situation leads back to the old saying of ‘violence breeds violence’. Society needs to look at the death penalty as a poor form of justice instead of a quick fix of revenge.

Capital punishment has been found to be racially biased and discriminatory towards males and the poor. This is something else that goes against the morals of this nation. Discrimination is outlawed, yet it is still prevalent in our courts. “Of the 3,856 prisoners executed under civil authority in the United States during 1930-1965, 53.6 percent were blacks, yet during that time p

Some topics in this essay:
Press A-6, California Americans, Governor Ryan, Penalty Capital, Northwestern University, Charles Mansons, George Ryan, York City, Los Angeles, Thomas Jefferson, death penalty, capital punishment, innocent people, form justice, believe death, believe death penalty, death row, argument death penalty, society death, morally corrupt, study york, life imprisonment, life sentence prison, society death penalty, death penalty effect,