{"id":360,"date":"2011-10-25T18:59:15","date_gmt":"2011-10-25T22:59:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/borjeson.com\/?p=360"},"modified":"2011-10-31T16:10:57","modified_gmt":"2011-10-31T20:10:57","slug":"the-death-penalty%e2%80%94a-good-idea","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/borjeson.com\/?p=360","title":{"rendered":"The Death Penalty\u2014A Good Idea?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Thirty four states allow the death penalty, and polls show a majority of the people approve of the death penalty, but is it really a good idea?<\/p>\n

Recently, Mario Cuomo, former governor of New York, wrote,[1]<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cI have studied the death penalty for more than half my lifetime. I have debated it hundreds of times. I have heard all the arguments, analyzed all the evidence I could find, measured public opinion when it was opposed to the practice, when it was indifferent, and when it was passionately in favor. Always I have concluded the death penalty is wrong because it lowers us all; it is a surrender to the worst that is in us; it uses a power\u00a0 – the official power to kill by execution\u00a0 – that has never elevated a society, never brought back a life, never inspired anything but hate.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd it has killed many innocent people.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI believed as governor, and I still believe, that the practice and support for capital punishment is corrosive; that it is bad for a democratic citizenry and that it had to be objected to and so I did then, and I do now and will continue to for as long as it and I exist, because I believe we should be better than what we are in our weakest moments.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

He is not the only governor who has struggled with the death penalty.<\/p>\n

January 31, 2000<\/strong><\/p>\n

CHICAGO\u00a0<\/strong> \u2014 Governor George H. Ryan today declared a moratorium on executions of any more Illinois Death Row inmates until a Commission he will appoint to conduct a review of the administration of the death penalty in Illinois can make recommendations to him.<\/h6>\n

\u201cIf there was one moment when Illinois\u2019 death penalty began to die, it was on Feb. 5, 1999, when a man named Anthony Porter walked out of jail a free man.<\/p>\n

\u201cSitting in the governor\u2019s mansion, George Ryan watched Porter\u2019s release on television and wondered how a man could come within 50 hours of being executed, only to be set free by the efforts of a journalism professor, his students and a private investigator.<\/p>\n

\u201c \u2018And so I turned to my wife, and I said, how the hell does that happen? How does an innocent man sit on death row for 15 years and gets no relief,\u2019 Ryan recalled last year. \u2018And that piqued my interest, Anthony Porter.\u2019 \u201d[2]<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Since 1973, 139 people on death row have been exonerated in the United States.[3]<\/a><\/p>\n

But moral concerns are not the only reason for questioning the death penalty. FOX News, hardly a bastion of liberal thinking has taken note that the death penalty is expensive.[4]<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cAn Urban Institute study of Maryland’s experience with the death penalty found that a single death-penalty trial cost $1.9 million more than a non-death-penalty trial. Since 1978, the cost to taxpayers for the five executions the state carried out was $37.2 million dollars \u2014 each.<\/p>\n

\u201cSince 1983, taxpayers in New Jersey have paid $253 million more for death penalty trials than they would have paid for trials not seeking execution \u2014 but the Garden State has yet to execute a single convict.<\/p>\n

\u201cA recent Duke University study of North Carolina\u2019s death penalty costs found that the state could save $11 million a year by substituting life in prison for the death penalty.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut no state matches the dilemma of California, where almost 700 inmates are sitting on death row and, according to Natasha Minsker, author of a new report by the Northern California chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union\u2026Her study found that the cash-strapped state could immediately save $1 billion by eliminating the death penalty and imposing sentences of life without parole.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The Death Penalty Information Center reached a similar conclusion. In 2009 they reported[5]<\/a>,<\/p>\n

\u201cThe death penalty in the U.S. is an enormously expensive and wasteful program with no clear benefits. All of the studies on the cost of capital punishment conclude it is much more expensive than a system with life sentences as the maximum penalty. In a time of painful budget cutbacks, states are pouring money into a system that results in a declining number of death sentences and executions that are almost exclusively carried out in just one area of the country. As many states face further deficits, it is an appropriate time to consider whether maintaining the costly death penalty system is being smart on crime.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe death penalty has been a bloated government program for many decades. The death penalty is not just expensive, it is wasteful. In most places the money is being spent even as the core measures of the system\u2014death sentences and executions\u2014have declined precipitously. It is as if a car manufacturer was keeping all of its factories and showrooms open even though it was producing only a handful of cars that hardly anyone was buying.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Proponents of the death penalty frequently complain that costs are high because of the seemingly interminable appeals process. But the appeals process is only the tip of the iceberg. Once the death penalty goes on the table everything gets more expensive as the DPIC noted.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe extra expenses begin mounting as soon as counsel are appointed in a potential death penalty case.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

We are not the only country in the world that executes prisoners. In 2010 there were executions in 23 countries.[6]<\/a><\/p>\n

China (unknown 1000+)
\nIran (252+)
\nNorth Korea (60+)
\nYemen (53+)
\nUnited States of America (46)
\nSaudi Arabia (27+)
\nLibya (18+)
\nSyria (17+)
\nBangladesh (9+)
\nSomalia (8+)
\nSudan (6+)
\nthe Palestinian Authority (5)
\nEgypt (4)
\nEquatorial Guinea (4)
\nTaiwan (4)
\nBelarus (2)
\nJapan (2)
\nIraq (1+)
\nMalaysia (1+)
\nBahrain (1)
\nBotswana (1)
\nSingapore (+)
\nViet Nam (+)<\/p>\n

Is this really the company we want to keep?<\/p>\n

There are serious errors with the justice system sending innocent people to death row. The death penalty is expensive. It holds us up to ridicule by all other advanced nations. And it doesn\u2019t even work. States with the death penalty show a higher murder rate than states without the death penalty.[7]<\/a> Its sole purpose is to allow sleazy politicians to try to win election by appealing to the worst in our nature.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

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[1]<\/a> Mario M. Cuomo, Death penalty is dead wrong: It’s time to outlaw capital punishment in America \u2013 completely<\/a>, <\/strong>New York Daily News, October 2, 2011<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

[2]<\/a> Steve Mills, What killed Illinois’ death penalty<\/a>, Chicago Tribune, March 10, 2011<\/em><\/p>\n

On March 9, 2011 Governor Pat Quinn signed the law abolishing the death penalty in Illinois.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

[3]<\/a> Wikipedia contributors, List of exonerated death row inmates<\/a>, retrieved October 25, 2011<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

[4]<\/a> Ed Barnes, Just or Not, Cost of Death Penalty Is a Killer for State Budgets<\/a>, FOXNews.com, March 27, 2010<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

[5]<\/a> Death Penalty Information Center, \u201cSmart on Crime: Reconsidering the Death Penalty in a Time of Economic Crisis<\/a>\u201d, October 2009<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

[6]<\/a> Amnesty International, Death Sentences and Executions 2010<\/a>, March 2011<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n

[7]<\/a> Death Penalty Information Center, Deterrence: States Without the Death Penalty Have Had Consistently Lower Murder Rates<\/a>, retrieved October 25, 2011<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Thirty four states allow the death penalty, and polls show a majority of the people approve of the death penalty, but is it really a good idea? Recently, Mario Cuomo, former governor of New York, wrote,[1] \u201cI have studied the … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[3],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/borjeson.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/360"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/borjeson.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/borjeson.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/borjeson.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/borjeson.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=360"}],"version-history":[{"count":19,"href":"https:\/\/borjeson.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/360\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":371,"href":"https:\/\/borjeson.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/360\/revisions\/371"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/borjeson.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=360"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/borjeson.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=360"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/borjeson.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=360"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}