Capital Punishment 16

Capital Punishment

Capital punishment, more commonly know as the death penalty, has been a fixture in society, dating back to the earliest of civilizations, and continues to be used as a form of punishment in certain countries today. The Eight Amendement of the U.S. Constitution proclaims the right of evey individual to protection
from deprivation of life by stating that no one shall be subjected to cruel and degrading punishment. Today, there remain several arguments that may be used against cpital punishment, such as the fact that it has not been proven to deter criminals from commiting capital offenses. Anothere keen argument is that

when executing the alleged, there is always a slight possibility of their innoocence. The death penalty should be abolished because it has been forbisdden by the U.S. Constitution as a form of cruel and unusual punishment, it has no proof of acting as a deterrent, and it risks teh injustice of innocent people.

    The Eighth Amendement clearly states that "excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed,nor cruel and unusual punishment inflicted."   The methods of inforcing capital punishment have ranged from beheading in France eo those methods used today, such as hanging,electrocution, lethal injection, and the gas chamber.   During regular executions things have been known to go wrong and the offender is put through a great deal of pain. In 1983, for example Joseph Tafero was strapped to the electric chair, alive, for a full six minutes before flames began shooting out of his head (The Bureau of Justice Statistics ).   No matter what technique is used, the death penalty is a form of cruel punishment that takes the life of a human being; this cannot be justified.

  The most severe probem that comes with capital punishment is that innocent people continue to be sentenced to death and executed. For example, Donald Marshall spent 11 years in prison before being exonerated. In the United States, one...