The death penalty is a punishment that I believe should not be used in any state, and the United States Government should pass a law that bans the use of it. There are many reasons why I feel this way, but a main factor is that there are flaws in this system. For example, from 1989 to today, there have been 10 cases where a person could have been wrongfully executed, and was actually innocent. I believe that this is unacceptable. Innocent lives could be spared if this law was discontinued, and there are sensible alternatives to the death penalty that still result in the committer of the crime being punished. The Government enforces a law to not kill others, but when someone does, they are killed! It is very hypocritical. Here are my reasons to support why I believe that this law should be discontinued.

The first reason that supports my belief about the discontinuation of the death penalty is that there are alternatives to death of the committer. Life in prison without the possibility of parole is not only good because it keeps violent offenders off the streets for good, but it is also cheaper. Also, the millions of dollars used for a death penalty case could be instead given to the family of the victim, which could be used for therapy and counseling to help get their lives back together, since the death of the committer can in no way heal the sadness towards the loss of a loved one. A South African social rights activist named Desmond Tutu once said, “To take a life when a life has been lost is revenge, not justice." This is very interesting: Part of justice is doing what is right, and according to almost every religion, killing a person is wrong, no matter what the reason is.

My next reason is that people have been sentenced to death who may have been innocent. This is completely unacceptable and unfair to both the accused committer and his or her family. There have been 4 people over the past 2 years who may have been wrongfully sentenced to death. Also, relating to an earlier topic that I had brought up regarding alternatives to the death penalty, if a man was wrongfully accused of murder, he was sentenced to life in prison, and it was later evident that he was innocent, he could be released. If an innocent man was sentenced to death and was killed, he could never be brought back from the dead.

A third reason that backs my belief is that many other nations that are just as civilized as we are think that we are barbaric for using such uncivilized methods. We set a bad image for other nations, and if our government has national pride so great that it entered a “Space Race” with the Soviet Union, shouldn’t it want to portray a good image to other countries?

In Summation, I strongly disagree with the continuation of the death penalty in the United States for three specific reasons. First, there are cheaper, more effective alternatives to the death penalty. Second, there have been innocent people who have been killed. Third, it is ironic that a nation with so much national pride in their advancements in technology punishes killers by killing them. These reasons support why I feel that the death penalty should be discontinued by all states in the United States of America.