Capital punishment also known as the death penalty in the United States has been around since the founding of the first thirteen colonies but it has been proven to be around since late 1700 BC when it was seen as a theory of an “eye for an eye”. Originally, death was supposed to be slow and painful and was delivered by; stoning, crushing, hanging, and being burned but as of now lethal injection, electrocution, and gas chambers are more common. Over time, capital punishment has been controversial and has slowly become legal in only 28 states. Currently, it is defined as “capital punishment, also called the death penalty, execution of an offender sentenced to death after conviction by a court of law of a criminal offense.” (Hood, 2020). It has been the sternest form of corporal punishment since it entails taking away the lives of convicted offenders by law enforcement. It is an act that can only be ordered by the state. There is a number of arguments put forth both for and against the aspect of the death penalty. Capital Punishment is ethically wrong and does more harm than good because it runs the risk of wrongful execution, brutalizes society by failing to stop more crimes from being committed (deterrence) and lastly, goes against the value of human life.
Wrongful executions are common in U.S. history. It wasn’t until 1986 that DNA testing was first used for a criminal investigation but even after, there still is a number of people sitting on death row awaiting capital punishment. The ethical study of deontology formally goes against the killing of people especially those who are innocent.. Using the normative ethical theory, the morality of an action must be based on whether the action itself is right or wrong under a set of rules, instead of based on the consequences of the action. Therefore, while many argue that executing one person reduces the risk of the crime being committed again, in contrast, “many deontologists would say that even if death would save hundreds of other lives, it is never morally acceptable to kill an innocent person. Furthermore, some deontologists believe that some right actions should be taken not because of their outcome but because they help set a precedent and a moral norm.” (Mohn, 2020). 18th-century philosopher, Emmanuel Kant was the first to define deontological principles. Kant believed that if one has goodwill they have good intentions while respecting a moral law that deserves to be a universal law in this case the moral law, is do not kill. Deontologists view argues that capital punishment is morally wrong. The possibility of executing innocent individuals makes the issue of the death penalty seem very wrong as most people who have received capital punishment have been proven innocent after more investigation has been done.
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As mentioned before the procedure of capital punishment is said to reduce criminal activity, it is shown that capital punishment fails to deter which results in the brutalization of society. States that withhold the Death penalty show an increase in the murder rate. “In the USA, more murders take place in states where capital punishment is allowed. In 2010, the murder rate in states where the death penalty has been abolished was 4.01 percent per 100,000 people. In states where the death penalty is used, the figure was 5.00 percent.” (BBC, 2014). The concept of deterrence is morally flawed. If someone who was plotting to commit a criminal offense knew that he could possibly face death, they would reconsider committing the crime but this is not the case. John Stuart Mill’s idea of utilitarianism claims actions are right if they tend to promote happiness, and wrong if they tend to produce unhappiness. If a person believes they will gain happiness from committing a crime, they will do so. While Mill has rejected an objection to his theory saying that it permits crimes (Mill’s harm principle) he gives no concrete case that it does not. His principle can be criticized because of its vagueness, the definition of “harm” may differ for each person. For example, if I do not clean my room and that somehow harms my mother, I should feel compelled to clean my room. The vagueness of his principle can interfere with the liberties that Mill wanted. When it comes to committing crimes, punishing someone who commits a crime through violence brutalizes society. The practice of the death penalty shows some negative attributes of society as it emphasizes killing as the right way to act in some situations. Doctor Gary. W Potter writes, “Social scientists refer to this as the 'brutalization effect.' Execution stimulates homicides in three ways: (1) executions desensitize the public to the immorality of killing, increasing the probability that some people will be motivated to kill; (2) the state legitimizes the notion that vengeance for past misdeeds is acceptable; and (3) executions also have an imitation effect, where people actually follow the example set by the state, after all, people feel if the government can kill its enemies, so can they” (Potter, 1999). Potter then continues to write how study after study has proven that capital punishment hurts more than helps society. The brutalization of society due to capital punishment also goes against Thomas Aquians’s natural law theory. According to the natural law theory, we must live in a good community. We must avoid offense in order to keep the good in society. As it has been proven, capital punishment does not create order in society and help decrease the crime rate but it does the opposite causing corruption. Statistics have shown that capital punishment is not a great solution as the states that execute the death penalty have not shown any significant signs of reduction of violent criminal activities hence it is more ethical to apply other forms of sentencing other than execution as it will eliminate killing which is morally wrong.
Natural law theory also emphasized the importance of the value of human life which capital punishment goes against. There is a chain reaction between the value of human life and capital punishment. It first begins with one seeing their life is valuable, then seeing the value in someone else's life, reason then leads us to see that killing violates natural law. Aquanis’s had answers to those who question why people violate the natural law of not killing which was ignorance and emotions. Along with Aquinas, John Locke also emphasized the values of human life and their rights. Locke founded fundamental natural rights; life, liberty, health, and property. Locke states, “All mankind, who will but consult it, that being all equal and independent, no one ought to harm another in his life, liberty, or possessions.”(Munro, 2020). Using Locke's theories, everyone has the inalienable right to life, even those who committed a criminal offense, sentencing a person to execution violates their natural born right. A common counter-argument to the right to life is that once someone commits a crime such as murder, they are automatically giving up their rights because they know the consequences that come with a criminal offense. Although Aquinas's natural law theory values human life and a good society, he also believed that “... if any man is dangerous to the community and is subverting it by some sin, the treatment to be commended is his execution in order to preserve the common good... Therefore to kill a man who retains his natural worthiness is intrinsically evil, although it may be justifiable to kill a sinner just as it is to kill a beast, for, as Aristotle points out, an evil man is worse than a beast and more harmful.” (BBC, 2014). In certain situations, the killing of somebody can inevitably be considered an act of good. The killing of someone was done in order to repair the violation of justice done by the person that was killed. Within current events, we can see many people who are “pro-life” (against abortion) but support the death penalty. They value the life of an unborn child but not the life of a convict because the killing of the person receiving the death penalty is good for society unlike the death of an unborn child because the fetus did no wrong. We can commonly see this contradiction of beliefs within certain religions.
The use of capital punishment is a morally incorrect form of criminal justice because it runs into a number of ethical issues and has been proven to be an ineffective method of societal restoration. While the counter-argument is that it is acceptable to kill somebody for a “good cause”, there is no other evidence that it deters people from committing crimes but it in fact has the opposite effect on crime rates. Although advances in evidence have made it easier to convict people of criminal offenses about 4% of people that are sitting on death row awaiting their capital punishment are wrongfully convicted and executed. Along with wrongful execution, the death penalty also brutalizes society by desensitizing people from killing others and shows the imitation effect. Lastly, capital punishment goes against the value of human life. Everyone is born with the natural right to life and can not have that right taken away from them. Those who support it argue the death penalty can restore society and control the amount of evil within it while those that oppose it argue it is immoral to put death upon any person and that justice should be shown to the offenders through other sentences other than taking the life away from the offender.
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