Should we just be philosophical about capital punishment?

Great Debates
121

Damn, I just hate it when prosecutors come across all reasonable like that… :smiley:

I’ve said it elsewhere, but my big issues with the death penalty really aren’t down to cost. We would probably disagree on the chances of wrongful conviction, though, but that is a matter of degree.

My biggest real problems come down with the inequities in its imposition, and also the effects down the chain. I hate the way that it is used as a hammer to encourage pleas in less clear cut cases, and the way in which it sucks in defense/appelate resources that could be more effectively used on other cases where there is more doubt as to guilt, and where a potentially innocent man ends up facing life in prison. The latter isn’t a problem caused by prosecutors, its a problem resulting from the priorities of legal defense organizations.

122

Heres an ACLU execution story. Since 1973 108 death row inmates have been found innocent. That is 1 in 8. That is not rare by my definition.
Since 1979 ,82 percent of the executed have lived in 10 states. So factors are where you live, how much money you have and what color you are.
It also shows that 1/6 of the defense lawyers for death penalty cases were disbarred of reprimanded.
The death penalty is unfairly applied. More than that if it were it still diminishes us all. We are giving in to the basest elements of our humanity, We should strive to be better than that.

123

One in eight? You’re comparing the number of people released and exonerated to the number who have been executed. That’s a meaningless comparison, like saying, “800 people live in my apartment building, and 100 DMV workers like Cool Ranch Doritos. That’s 1 in 8!” Um, no, it’s not, because one number isn’t a subset of the other. If you want a valid comparison, compare the number of people released (108) to the total number of people sentenced, which according to this page on an anti-death penalty site is 7,115 since 1977. So, more like 1.5%, or 1 in 67.

That’s kind of the point. As in, “If you’re gonna kill someone, don’t do it in Texas.”

Oh boy, the old racism argument. People who make that claim rarely look critically at the numbers. This page tells us that, of those executed since 1976, 34% were black, and 57% were white. Well, since blacks are, what is it now, about 12% of the general population of the US, this clearly shows racism, right?

If that was as far as your inquiry went, you might make that conclusion. However, criminals do not represent an even spread of the population. Consider that for that same period, blacks represented 52.2% of murderers, compared to 45.8% for whites (DOJ murder statistics). So, a larger percentage of murders were committed by blacks, yet a larger percentage of whites were executed. The inescapable conclusion is that white murderers are more likely to be executed than black murderers. And the death penalty is only about “murderers”, not the population as a whole.

Now, the “money” argument is facially a bit more logical, largely because poverty tends to breed violent crime, but I haven’t seen anyone collecting statistics on relative wealth of murderers, so I’m stumped for a way to prove either case.

Meaningless without telling us if the disbarments and reprimands were for their performance on the death penalty cases, or for unrelated causes. I can’t find out, because that NC outfit’s web page crashed my computer. In any case, you fail to note that that statistic is only for North Carolina, not for the entire nation.

You seem to take this as an article of faith, something that others will believe in without question. Why is it somehow less barbarous for a remorseless black-hearted killer to receive the same penalty as a third-strike meth dealer? Why is it more barbaric to require that, if you take life, you forfeit your own? Are we nobler if we make it known to killers that no matter how many they slaughter, the very worst that can ever happen to them is life in prison?

This last, by the way, is why I was not in favor of the Louisiana law permitting the death penalty for certain child rapists: if the child rapist knows that he can’t face a greater penalty, there’s no reason to leave his victim alive.

Capital punishment is how we demonstrate that cold blooded murder is intolerable, that it is worse than any other crime and deserves a penalty worse than any other penalty. And that is consistent with the aims of a moral society.

124

Then the bad guys just aren’t getting the point, as Texas consistently has a higher murder rate than the average of all non-death penalty states (In 2006, 5.9 per 100,000 for Texas, versus 4.22 per 100,000 in all non-death penalty states).

The word obviously isn’t getting out.

125

So, do you believe that China, Iran, Saudi Arabia and Pakistan are all behaving MORE consistently with the aims of a moral society than the U.S. is? Whereas places like Canada, the U.K. and Vatican City are behaving immorally by having abolished the death penalty?

Or do you really imagine that places like Europe simply don’t have any criminals of that magnitude?

126

For perspective, a couple of quotes from those involved…

127

So what you’re saying is, you have to average all of the non-DP states, most of which are nothing like Texas in population, geography, or demographics, and you end up with a lower murder rate? That sounds to me like cooking the numbers to meet a pre-determined goal. How about this: look on the very same chart you cited at the homicide rates of other states that border Mexico (New Mexico, Arizona, and California), and note that all of those states have generally higher murder rates than Texas, sometimes much higher. Yes, those states do technically have a death penalty, but Texas actually enforces theirs.

And in what world is it valid to compare crime rates between a border state with the second highest population in the nation, with three cities having populations over 1 million and three more over 500K, to Vermont and Rhode Island?

128

1 in 67 (though I am sure you don’t agree it is that high) would be an unacceptable error rate too, don’t you agree?

Isn’t it true that there is aa much stronger correlation between the race of the victim and the likelihood of the death penalty than between the race of the murderer and the use of execution? To the extent it is possible to argue that society values a white victim much higher?

129

Back up the absurd hyperbole truck, sparky. There are more ways to determine the relative moralities of distinct societies than whether or not they execute murderers. I didn’t say that “the US is more moral because we execute murderers”, I said that the death penalty is consistent with the aims of a moral society. As in, our society is not automatically immoral on the sole basis that we permit executions. Your statement is like saying, “Oh, you’re a vegetarian? Well, Hitler was a vegetarian, too! You must be just like Hitler!” There’s more to consider than that one factor.

130

Nonsense. States with death penalties have higher murder rates than states without. There is nothing more straightforward than that. When you start manipulating the data by changing which states can be compared to which other states, that is cooking the numbers.

131

I’m amazed that you don’t see the intellectual dishonesty in that statement. You’re comparing states that in total constitute about 12% of the total population, states that do not have the ethnic diversity or sheer number of large urban areas that exist in other states, and you declare them equal? I’ll concede that there are big cities in a handful of the non-DP states such as Massachusetts and Michigan, but honestly, Alaska? Vermont? North Dakota? Cripes, the murder rates there are probably lower just because they have trouble finding other people!

Time to sign off. I’ll address everything else tomorrow.

132

Way to evade the question, chuckles. Actually my statement is like saying, “Oh, you’re a vegetarian because you think it’s a healthier diet! Well do you think it was a healthier diet for Hitler?” At which point you might think I was trying to distract you by dragging Hitler into it, kind of like you just did.

I’m not asking about the relative morality of the entire society, just about this one feature that you feel “is consistent with the aims of a moral society.” So, I ask you again: do you think that Iran, in its approach to the death penalty, is more consistent with the aims of a moral society than the U.S.? Do you think that Vatican City is less consistent with the aims of a moral society because it hasn’t executed anyone since 1870?

Or since you’ve got Hitler on the brain, maybe you’d like to contrast the U.S. with Germany in this regard? They banned the death penalty before reunification. Obviously Germans don’t tend to commit crimes worthy of death like Americans do. Or maybe Germany has forgotten that government executions are more consistent with the aims of a moral society, you think?

133

Your defense of the death penalty is revenge and blood lust. You lose all the data arguments . You lose the moral arguments.

134

I’m way late to this thread, but just a note on the cost of capital punishment versus life without parole (LWOP):

You aren’t eligible for the death penalty unless you committed a particularly heinous crime, and your prosecutor is unlikely to go for the death penalty unless the crime is getting some press coverage because it is a difficult sentence to go for and so it takes a lot of time and energy. Due to this, pretty much only people who have no experience in prosecuting a death penalty case ever attempt it, as they’re the only ones who have something to gain through it (free publicity for an up-and-comer) and simply due to the rarity of eligibles.

Now, while one would think that anyone who is going to be spending their life in prison would appeal like crazy for fifty years, LWOPers only seem to appeal once for their whole duration of time in prison. Death penaltyers appeal something like sixteen times.

The reason for the discrepancy between expectation and reality is that an “appeal” is based on pointing out technical flaws in the original trial, not a re-examination of the evidence. Now since DP prosecutors generally have no experience prosecuting a DP case and since DP trials require very specific paths that must be followed to the T, it is simply sixteen times more likely that an error will be found. And since there are so many things to appeal–for instance, 6% of Texas’ criminal appeals are from DPers even though they’re a vanishingly small percentage of the prisoner population–there’s money to be made in that area of lawyering, so there are people who have experience in finding flaws in the original proceedings, where there aren’t experienced prosecutors. And so 85% of DPers have a successful appeal and in the re-trial the death penalty isn’t sought, so they become LWOPers who cost a lot of money to get to that status. This is where all the money goes.

So while you can say that, in the end result, it costs a lot of money to have the death penalty, this is really rather intellectually dishonest. The anti-DP crowd has established enough laws on both the federal and state levels that it’s infeasible to achieve and maintain a death penalty verdict except by spending ungodly amounts of money to force your way through anyways.

And with only a vanishingly small percentage of people even getting the death penalty, let alone even actually getting executed, of course it has no deterrent effect.

Now on a moral level, there is certainly an argument to be made. “Evidence” is in most cases something that can change with time, while as a death sentence is final. But outside of arguing on moral grounds, arguments against capital punishment are rather silly since the foundation of the arguments are reliant on the result of decades of anti-capital punishment efforts. They’ve made it so that only unskilled, lowly prosecutors will prosecute it, and they’ve made it so it’s near impossible to keep once you’ve gotten it. So it’s no wonder that only the poor get charged. It’s no wonder that it’s not a deterrent. It’s no wonder that it costs a lot.

135

Um, no. You took one factor that various societies have in common (permitting executions) and used that common factor to equate the total moralities of those societies. Obviously, even considering the single factor of the death penalty, there is a huge moral difference in how the penalty is applied. So, no, I don’t think that Iran’s application of the death penalty is the moral equivalent of the way it is applied in the US, nor do I feel that Vatican City is less moral for having abolished it. What I am saying is that the US is not automatically immoral solely because we have the death penalty. Is that clearer?

By lack of understanding or by choice, you are completely misrepresenting my argument. I never said “more consistent,” that isn’t my belief, and I’m not about to argue that position. If you can either argue about what I actually said, I’ll keep listening. Otherwise, it appears we’re done.

136

I’ve been searching and searching for statistics on the number of general felony cases filed and the number that are later reversed or remanded on appeal; it appeared late yesterday that around 5% of felony convictions were later reversed or remanded, but having shut down when I left yesterday, I lost my links to the stats pages at the Bureau of Justice Statistics. I can probably find them again if you’re interested. In any case, if that’s accurate, then the reversal rate for capital cases is lower than the reversal rate in general, which to me indicates a higher level of accuracy (which isn’t surprising, given the higher amount of scrutiny such cases receive). And while I’m sure many here wouldn’t agree, the number of people released from death row is to me a positive indication that the checks built into the system function properly.

An interesting question that has some peculiar nuances. Indeed, it does appear from the statistics that the death penalty is more likely to be sought in cases where the murder victim is white. As we discussed earlier, blacks commit more than 50% of all murders. Also, most murders are not interracial; “from 1976 to 2005, 86% of white victims were killed by whites, and 94% of black victims were killed by blacks” (BJS cite). Most interracial killings are “stranger homicides”, meaning that the victims didn’t know each other; in stranger homicides, blacks killed white victims about 17.5-21% of the time, while whites killed black victims 3.6-6.6% of the time. For acquaintance homicides, blacks kill white victims about 3.8-6.6% of the time, and whites kill black victims about 1.5-3.4% of the time (cite for all this). At least a part of the disparity may be because juries are more likely to assess the death penalty in a stranger homicide case than in an acquaintance homicide case, and whites are the victims in over 60% of stranger homicides. But, that’s a guess, I’m not sure if that’s ever been studied.

137

Okay, I apologize for muddying the waters. I think I am beginning to see why I am misunderstanding you. Yes, I was citing that factor (permitting executions) as one facet of those societies’ total morality-- just as the presence or absence of government-sanctioned torture or slavery might be taken into consideration in this regard.

Not really, no. You have stated that we can’t judge a society’s total morality solely by considering a single factor. Fine. You also claim that the US is not automatically immoral because we have the death penalty. I’m not sure what this means. Are you suggesting that there are other single factors that make a society automatically immoral, and the death penalty just doesn’t happen to be one of them?

Well, I’m not kidding around anymore: I don’t understand what you mean. Earlier, you said:

Taken all together, you appear to be arguing that the death penalty itself is intrinsically amoral-- there is no essential moral distinction between a society with the death penalty and a society without. We can’t say that the U.S. is immoral because it has the death penalty; we can’t say that Canada is immoral because it doesnt.

But this seems to undercut your original argument. Because you appear to justify capital punishment in moral terms-- it’s the right thing to do, for certain intolerable crimes. It is deserved. You argue that any moral distinction is solely in how it is applied. But what about those countries that have no death penalty? Surely they have criminals that have committed crimes just as heinous as those of American criminals. So why did those countries abolish the death penalty in the first place? They seem to get along just fine without it.

So why shouldn’t the United States follow their example? If I understand your position correctly, it shouldn’t affect the nation’s morality at all. So there’s really no good reason to keep it.

Feel free to correct me here. I promise, I am not deliberately misunderstanding you. I’m sorry if the above comes across as confused. I was sincerely trying to be cogent, but I’m a naturally confused person in a lot of ways.

138

I think it is both. I would MUCH rather be on trial for murderin the US, even with the death penalty, than say in Russia, without the death penalty, but with dubious due process. So yes, appelate success for death row prisoners is on the one hand a sign that the system is working - those people are exonerated. But it is also, like any appelate success, a sign that the system has failed, in that an innocent person is convicted.

I think it would be naive to assume that a system which makes errors in the form of wrongful conviction catches ALL of them at the appeals level. I am sure you would agree that there is a possibility that mistakes are made. All we can argue about in the end is whether the potential numbers of errors are outwieghed by the benefits of the death penalty. You think they are. I disagree, mainly because I think the benefits of it are heavily overstated by its defenders.

This can lead us into a debate that has been pursued at length by the race and law brigade - is our criminal system set up in such a way that it overpunishes “black” crime and underpunishes “white” crime. It goes way beyond the death penalty, obviously, to areas such as the disaprity between powder and crack cocaine sentencing.

The trouble with the whole debate, as I think we agree, is that the raw numbers are meaningless. The fact that Texas has a higher murder rate than Maine is pretty much irrelevant, given the differences between the states. What is needed is a controlled experiment. A state which removes the death penalty, and has no other factors change, so we can see what happens to the crime rate. Unfortunately, everything changes. There is really no way of finally knowing the answer to the deterrence question. My gut is that it doesn’t work. Yours is that it does. I’ll admit you have a much closer association with criminals than I do, and I’m not talking about your fellow prosecutors here… :smiley: