Capital Punishment
...on. One of the big questions with the death penalty, as you read above, is whether or not it detters crime rates. Those in favor of the death penalty would argue that it does. Usually stating, some thing allong the lines of the fear of death stopping people from commiting crimes. Even going to the point of saying that it has a detterent influence on crimes across state lines into juristictions that abollished the death penalty.Some believe that in order to achieve a better society you would have to do it through intimidation. But there is indeed another side to this argument with some statistics to back it up. Isaac Elhric conducted a study spanning twenty five years, from 1957-1982. It shows that in 57 there were 8,060 murders and 65 executions. Now you would think that the murder rate would gradually lower year by year but, the study states that last year there were 22,520 murders commited. It is clearly shown that capital punishment never detered crime and probably never will. Another problem with capital punishment is the irrevesable effect of a wrongful conviction. If some one went to jail for a crime they didn't commit they would be set free, but if they are put to death, then there is nothing you could do. Death Penalty supporters say that it is to slim of a chance that some one would be put to death that is wrongfully convicted. Yet, in t...