Reviving The Death Penalty
...famous sayings in the world. It comes from the Mosaic Law in the Bible and it
is an edict that has ruled millions for thousands of years. Today the issue of
capital punishment has our nation split down the middle. The two sides have
drawn lines in the sand and are emphatically holding their ground. The need for
capital punishment is greater today then it has been at anytime in the past for
several reasons. The crime rate is soaring out of control. Murders are tearing
our people, our cities, and country apart. Many people have the same belief as
Thomas Draper, an author on the book called Capital Punishment, that no society
can abolish crime, so their only hope is to do everything they can to control it.
It is time for the United States to mandate the death penalty for the crime of
murder in all 50 states and to carry out the executions of those sentenced to
death. Capital Punishment is the lawful infliction of the death penalty. In
England, by 1500, only major felonies carried the death penalty: treason,
murder, larceny, burglary, rape, and arson. The American colonies adhered with
Englands' view on the death penalty, for there was little they could do about it.
However in the 1750's reform movements spread through Europe, and in 1847 they
reached the United States. In 1847, Michigan became the first state to abolish
the death penalty for murder.
Beginning in 1967, executions were suspended to allow the appellate
courts to decide whether the death penalty was unconstitutional. In 1972, the
Supreme Court ruled in Furman v. Georgia that the death penalty for murder or
for rape violated the prohibition against "cruel and unusual punishment" (Bedau
1). Four years later the Supreme Court reversed its decision in Gregg v. Georgia.
They held the death penalty for murder and rape was not unconstitutional. The
next year executions resumed, and by 1991, some...
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