Capital punishment should remain a relic of Britains past; Forget the moral arguments - practical considerations render it ludicrous Today marks the 15th anniversary of the abolition of capital punishment in the United Kingdom. With crime a continual bugbear of the media, there is a persistent debate regarding whether the criminal justice system is too soft on those that transgress the law of the land, and undoubtedly capital punishment forms part of this debate. So though Britain, in common with virtually all Western nations, has abandoned the practice of sentencing people to death, would it be a viable idea to resurrect it? I am a big advocate of direct democracy, and still am in principle, but capital punishment would be one issue where I would almost certainly disagree with the majority of people. I feel quite confident to assert that if there was a referendum on the issue then the majority of people would vote in favour of the return of capital punishment. There is no doubt that the public perception is that criminals are treated with excessive leniency in Britain, and that a tougher regime would deter crime. This is profoundly misguided for several reasons. If capital punishment, a highly extreme policy which essentially involves state-sanctioned murder, is remotely justifiable then it must be shown to be a deterrent, to be practically workable, and for the systems in place that administrate it to be infallible. Lets test out the veracity of those three elements within the context of our current society. Firstly, we already have a Western example to consider in which capital punishment presently takes place. 32 American states currently sentence people to death. 7 of the top 10 states in America in terms of murder rates currently operate the death penalty, namely Louisiana, Mississippi, South Carolina, Alabama, Arizona, Missouri and Tennessee. Its not hard to get hold of this information because its openly available on a pro-death penalty website! So I think we can put the deterrent argument to bed. In the case of the United States, it is well-known that those who are to be sentenced to death linger on so-called death rows for years; in fact in 2010, the average was 15 years. These are the American Justice Departments own figures. This is hardly surprising; in such a litigious society it is inevitable that any death sentence will result in a huge legal tug-of-war. This almost without exception turns out to be more expensive than simply life imprisonment, as well as putting an incalculable strain on those who live in a constant hiatus regarding their own existence, while tolerating conditions that most people wouldnt enforce upon animals. Many people might argue that the conditions that murderers live in are no cause for concern. Except when they turn out to be innocent, of course. Between 1950 and 1953, when Britain executed an average of 17 people per annum, four individuals were wrongly sentenced to death. Three have since been exonerated, and one has been pardoned. As far as we know, the other 64 people who were executed had committed the crimes of which they were accused. But I use the expression as far as we know advisedly. There will always be doubt regarding the criminal justice system, there will always be mistakes, and there will always be the possibility that evidence will be uprooted which casts new light on a particular verdict. In the United States, nearly 150 individuals have been completely exonerated of their crimes after being executed. In addition, it is claimed that nearly 40 further people have been executed despite evidence of innocence or serious doubt about guilt, which the state refused to take into consideration. So thats nearly 200 people who should be living, who have potentially done nothing wrong, who have been killed by the state, which also proclaims itself to be moral arbiter of what is right and wrong. This simply cannot be accepted in a civilised society. If one asks the average person in Britain their opinion of the government, the court system and the police, it is almost certain that one will receive a negative response. It therefore rather flies in the face of logic to give these people the power to decide who lives and who dies, regardless of the moral implications. Which are, needless to say, immense. (source: Christopher Morris is a regular contributor to Yahoo on television, cinema, video games, technology and politics; Yahoo News)
Posted on: Sun, 10 Nov 2013 11:49:02 +0000
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