Death to the Death Penalty!

Nobody has ever come up to me and said that death is quintessentially American; though if they did, I would be hard-pressed to argue.  Our militarism abroad is matched only by our support for it at home.  We boast a nation chock-full of hunters and murderers.  Thanks to the recent expiration of the assault weapons ban, I can drive up to New Hampshire and pick up an automatic assault rifle at the local gun show - legally with no background check and no questions asked.  Contrast this with other industrialized nations such as Japan, where civilians and not allowed guns period.  When Osama Bin Laden was killed several months ago, the celebration (of death, mind you) in the streets of Boston rivaled those of sports championships.  Should this national celebration of death be extrapolated to the actual death penalty?

Rick Perry certainly thinks so, and the audience seems to agree - talk about a celebration of death.  You would think religious conservatives such as Perry would be conflicted, what with that whole "thou shalt not kill" commandant.  Though he and others would likely point to the bible for justification, specifically "an eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth" (Matthew 5:38).  It's true that most do not wish to die, so supporters of capital punishment argue that it acts a deterrent, figuring someone considering murder will think twice about it when faced with possibility of being murdered themselves.  They additionally proselytize that the death penalty is appropriate as a means of deterring potential murderers already serving life sentences; and that paroled inmates or escapees would have another opportunity to kill if not executed.  It is also an albeit wry solution to the very real problem of prison overcrowding, as states need not house those no longer alive.  Still, the argument most championed is simply that it provides closure for the families of murder victims.

Back in the real world though, the contention that capital punishment discourages murder is utterly laughable.  Not only have there been nearly nine-tenths of a million murders in the United States since 1960 (Federal Bureau of Investigation and Matthew White), but among states with the top twenty murder rates in 2010, sixteen had the death penalty (Death Penalty Information Center).  If capital punishment does serve as a deterrent, it isn't a very effective one.  Financially speaking, it actually costs the government more to execute people.  From the lengthy appeals process to the last meal, it can sometimes take twenty years from conviction to execution, as it did in the much publicized case of Troy Davis.  Which brings us to the most important point: the indisputable truth that not all on death row are guilty.  In fact, 138 innocent death row inmates have been freed since 1973 (Death Penalty Information Center) - we can only imagine how many are now dead because they weren't freed.

But aside from everything else (the "cruel and unusual punishment" language in the Bill of Rights for example), there is still a more than convincing argument against capital punishment on strictly moral grounds.  How is it that we as a society have yet to move beyond the primitive idea of revenge killing?  With few exceptions, the rest of the industrialized world certainly has (they've also bothered to give their citizens universal heath care while they're at it).  The death penalty does not bring victims back to life and two wrongs do not make a right.  Why kill to prove killing is wrong?  That logic seems awfully contradictory.  Thank goodness conservatives are able to wrap their heads around this level of hypocrisy, because I certainly can't.