I'll say first off that I'm not a fan of the death penalty. There are so many ways that the system can go wrong, and so many moral difficulties involved, that I can't justify it. I would rather a guilty man live than an innocent man die by mistake. And I'm not convinced that the state has the right to decide to end someone's life, regardless of what they've done. I'm all for life without parole, and I think the current trend of life in prison really meaning XX years with good behavior is ridiculous. Murderers, child abusers, etc, should not be back on the streets. Ever. But I can't justify killing them.
However, there is the fact that we're paying for the whole process, and while I am not mercenary, part of me wants to take that money and use it to help starving children so they never end up in prison in the first place.
This is an argument that comes up a lot. "Our tax dollars are paying to keep these people alive; the death penalty means we aren't spending money to feed/clothe/house/etc. criminals." Although that makes sense, there are a lot of statistics that claim that executing a prisoner costs significantly
more than the cost of imprisoning him (or her) for the rest of his life. Those facts are in dispute, depending who you ask, but I'm inclined to discount the financial argument since it isn't clear-cut.
Until you have a family member murdered you cannot understand the relief and closure that their murder getting the death penality can give. I had an uncle murdered in a robbery who left behind a wife and 5 children ranging from teenagers to very young. His daughters were unable to be walked down the aisle when they were married, his only son who was the youngest didn't have a man to guide him into manhood, his wife didn't have her husband to grow old with.
Maybe I'm just overly sensitive, but this seems a little... condescending to me. I don't mean to diminish your loss, by any means, and maybe I can't imagine what his family went through. But people lose loved ones for lots of reasons, and rarely do they get "closure" of any kind.
If your uncle had been killed by a teenage driver, would killing the teenager give the family closure? The loss of a husband and father would be just as sudden, as unexpected, as painful. But I don't think very many people would advocate putting the teenager to death.
I realize that the difference there is the intent of the killer, and I guess that's the heart of the issue. We imprison murderers so they will not kill again, while the teenage driver would get a lesser sentence because he's unlikely to kill again. He would still go on to get married, father children, etc. Where is the closure in that?
And the court system isn't perfect. If the wrong man were executed, would that give the family closure? Not only would the real killer be free, but their need for retribution would have killed an innocent man. All in all, I don't know that the family's need for closure is a valid argument.
Yes, if my loved one were murdered, I would vengeance. If there had been someone I could have blamed when my mother died (of leukemia), I might very well have lost my head and gone after them. But as a state we have to keep a level head. Vengeance isn't a good enough motivation, imho, to methodically and coolly kill another person.
