Discussion Board Topic: death penalty

Death Penalty

Texas carries out the death penalty more than any other state.

Executions by State since 1976 (Updated May 17, 2018)
State	Total Executions
Texas	551
Virginia	113
Oklahoma	112
Florida	96
Missouri	88
Georgia	72
Alabama	63
Ohio	55
North Carolina	43
South Carolina	43
Arizona	37
Arkansas	31
Louisiana	28
Mississippi	21
Indiana	20
Delaware	16
California	13
Illinois	12
Nevada	12
Utah	7
Tennessee	6
Maryland	5
Washington	5
U.S. Federal Gov’t	3
Idaho	3
Kentucky	3
Montana	3
Nebraska	3
Pennsylvania	3
South Dakota	3
Oregon	2
Colorado	1
Connecticut	1
New Mexico	1
Wyoming	1

https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/number-executions-state-and-region-1976

And a very large majority of Texans support continued use of the death penalty. Here’s a Texas poll from 2015:

What is your opinion of the death penalty? Strongly support:          49% Somewhat support:       26% Somewhat oppose:        10% Strongly oppose:             9% Don’t know:                    6%

SOURCE: University of Texas/Texas Tribune Poll, February 2015 https://texaspolitics.utexas.edu/set/support-death-penalty-february-2015

But we know several things:

* the death penalty is far more expensive than life imprisonment without parole; https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/costs-death-penalty * the death penalty is not a deterrent to crime; https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/facts-about-deterrence-and-death-penalty * the death penalty is implemented in a racially unbalanced manner; https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/race-and-death-penalty * the death penalty has been carried out on innocent victims https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/innocence-and-death-penalty *lots of families of murder victims do not support the death penalty (so the "it brings closure to families" argument is questionable) https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/new-voices-victims-families or https://www.aclunc.org/sites/default/files/voices_from_california_crime_victims_for_alternatives_to_the_death_penalty.pdf

If you don’t think those things are true, you can easily use the links above or many others to prove it to yourself.

Given that the above statements are true, why do we still have capital punishment in Texas? What justification is there – beyond simple blood-lust vengeance – for capital punishment? Is vengeance an adequate reason for the state to kill people, even if sometimes we kill someone who is innocent?

Check out this last table:

Country	Executions 2017
China	>1,551
Iran	>525
Saudi Arabia	>130
Iraq	>111
Pakistan	>65
Egypt	>35
Somalia	24
United States	23
Jordan	15
North Korea	>11
Singapore	8
Kuwait	7
Bangladesh	6
Palestine	6
Afghanistan	5
Japan	4
Malaysia	4
South Sudan	4
Bahrain	3
Yemen	>2
Belarus	2
United Arab Emirates	1
Syria	unknown number
Vietnam	unknown number

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capital_punishment_by_country

Question Does the company the US keeps by retaining the death penalty cause you to question our continuing to perform executions?

What’s your opinion?

Should Texas, and should the US, continue to carry out executions?