Is Capital Punishment an effective penalty? Yes. It protects society and keeps order in it as well. Capital Punishment does not stop people from killing one another. However, the only thing it mainly does is stopping a known killer from killing more innocent people. I believe that it is a just and efficacious punishment for those who commit crimes bad enough to deserve death.
Now does the death penalty truly deter crimes and murder? This question is in the center of a big political controversy over this topic. Some people oppose the death penalty because of the many people on death row today. Statistics also state that states with capital punishment have a higher crime rate then those that do not. Therefore, it is not an effective penalty, it is ineffective and a waist of our hard earned tax dollars. This process costs between 500,000 to 1,000,000 dollars annually. I have to say that the states that have capital punishment are usually urbanized areas that have high crime rates because of the enormous population. Rather, in rural states there is no need for the death penalty because everyone is scattered around and the population is not as big.
Abolitionists explain that capital punishment is a racist penalty. They say it is only given to the minorities. It is not fair to say that because the sad fact is that the majority of the people on death row are blacks and whites. There are approximately 3,000 for both ethnic groups and the closest group after that is the Hispanic's with about 200. I think it is wrong to be racist, but if they get caught, no matter their race they should be sentenced to death.
I believe it is morally wrong to have mentally retarded people on death row, because, they do not have an understanding about things and they could accidentally kill someone out of curiosity. If someone says that they are mentally retarded to see if they can sneak out of getting capital punishment I think he should be sent to an experienced doctor and be pronounced mentally retarded.
