With respect to the death penalty, our justice system obviously needs reform. Wrongfully putting an innocent person to death is horrifying, and evidence suggests that such horror takes place with relative frequency. Since 1973, 123 people have been released from death row due to new emancipating evidence. That figure does not include those who have, undoubtedly, been wrongfully executed.
Moreover, current implementation of the death penalty is arbitrary, contingent on geography. For example, in Ohio, about one-quarter of the state's death row inmates come from Hamilton County, but only 9 percent of the state's murders occur there.
Such inconsistencies are mirrored across the country. The Dallas Morning News reported in 2000 that one in four death row inmates in Texas had been defended by lawyers who have been reprimanded, placed on probation or suspended or banned from practicing law by the State Bar. Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsberg remarked in 2001, "People who are well-represented at trial do not get the death penalty. ...I have yet to see a death case among the dozens coming to the Supreme Court on eve-of-execution stay applications in which the defendant was well-represented at trial."
Despite all this evidence, however, the merits of the death penalty still are numerous. A democratic government should always have the right to put to death those guilty of committing the most atrocious crimes. Consider that most criticism leveled against the death penalty critiques its implementation. Critics point out that it is used in an inconsistent fashion, with inadequate legal representation for those convicted. Most do not, however, challenge the merits of the penalty itself. There isn't a clear solution as to how to fix the many problems associated with the death penalty's application, but it is paramount for our justice system to retain it as an option.
To that end, John McAdams, a professor at Marquette University, has reasoned: "If we execute murderers and there is in fact no deterrent effect, we have killed a bunch of murderers. If we fail to execute murderers, and doing so would in fact have deterred other murders, we have allowed the killing of a bunch of innocent victims. I would much rather risk the former." Though McAdams' approach does not allow for the possibility of rehabilitation or false convictions, he does have a point. Avoiding judicial mistakes, the death penalty would be a very effective tool to safeguard against repeat offenders. Of course, many argue that life imprisonment without the possibility of parole is an effective safeguard as well, but in the end, some criminals simply deserve to die for what they have done.
Without the death penalty, the families of many victims would never obtain closure of their grief. Furthermore, some criminals simply cannot be rehabilitated. One of the main arguments against the death penalty is that sentencing an innocent person to death is too large a risk. However, false convictions happen quite often, and not just under the death penalty. If one were to extend the "risk argument," then one would have to argue against all legal penalties, as all judicial sentences potentially risk harming an innocent person in an imperfect judicial system.
Asking the judicial system to recognize its potential for mistakes and abolish the death penalty merely for the purpose of being able to release falsely convicted people at some later date is not only impractical but allows for more harm than good. If the death penalty were not overused in the first place, then falsely convicted people sentenced to death would be rare. However, abolishing the death penalty perpetuates the suffering of many families of victims and future victims of the convicted, as many criminals are able to continue crime from within the confines of prison.
This risk can be virtually wiped out by responsibly implementing the death penalty. California, the most populous state, has only executed 13 people since 1976, whereas Texas, my home state, has executed 376 people in that same period. The judicial system in Texas is absolutely horrific, given the ridiculous number of executions and the frequent disbarment of the attorneys who represent those convicted under the death penalty. The death penalty, as it is implemented in Texas, precludes the possibility for rehabilitation, serving as a convenient means to kill poor, uneducated people of color. On the other hand, the death penalty in California has been used to execute only a handful of dangerous criminals over the course of 30 years. This maximizes the social benefits brought about by maintaining the death penalty while answering the justified criticisms against a system such as in Texas.
Though the death penalty can have awful consequences, it is much harder to measure its benefits, though they do exist. Poet Hyman Barshay once wrote, "The death penalty is a warning, just like a lighthouse throwing its beams out to sea. We hear about shipwrecks, but we do not hear about the ships the lighthouse guides safely on their way. We do not have proof of the number of ships it saves, but we do not tear the lighthouse down." Certainly the death penalty could use improvements. But the problem does not lie with the death penalty itself - only with those who apply it.
Michael Ramos-Lynch '09 wishes death on crime.
