"Capital Punishment" Critique

  I think Elizabeth Sexton's editorial on capital punishment does a great job engaging the reader and highlights serious issues with the current system. I think that the debate over capital punishment often focuses on the morality of taking a persons life but she brings up an interest point of whether it is  constitutionally acceptable to kill someone. I suppose one could compare it to the country's ability to wage war, essentially killing people to stop inhumane acts. If capital punishment could be considered war against heinous crimes, then I could concede that government could require a persons life. The key to the issue currently, as Sexton points out, is that the justice system is in no way fool proof. I agree that there needs to be an iron-clad guilty verdict for someone to be considered for the death penalty. I would certainly hate to imagine myself at the mercy of "peers" with my life at stake. With a crime that is so terrible it warrants the death penalty, I think that emotion could cause the judgment of those involved to be suspect.

  All that being said, I still think that the death penalty may not be the "right" option. It is very hard to decide that we should be killing people. Ideally, I would say that those people, and all criminals, should be made to work for the benefit of the citizens. I have a hard time understanding how you can have all these prisoners and not have them doing something that would make up for their costs of living, besides making license plates... I think that capital punishment should definitely not be a cost consideration. Is it okay to pay these costs for a rapist, but not a rapist and murderer?


  So, if there isn't the cost incentive and the system is just, should we still use capital punishment? My answer is I don't know. I think that the government could, for the good of the people, although this is somewhat accounted for by simply imprisoning the criminal. I think it comes down to revenge vs retribution, as Sexton writes. If I was affected by a crime like these, I would want more than death for the criminal, but with a policy standpoint I don't like giving this power to others.


  In conclusion, I think Elizabeth Sexton does a great job presenting the issues on a very controversial topic. She provides many examples showing where capital punishment might have work as well as those situations where it seems to have been lacking, and ultimately may have cost an innocent person his or her life. I think she makes a very good argument for improving the system by which people are given these sentences and I enjoyed reading and commenting on her work.