Life or Death

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Life or Death

The Introduction

Timothy McVay, the Oklahoma City bomber, was executed in Terra Haute, Indiana, the city where I used to live. His execution was a very big deal in the town; we were all quite scared of what might happen that night. Luckily nothing did because that would have been a disaster. His execution by lethal injection sparked my interest in capital punishment.

I wanted to find out how many Americans are either for or against the death penalty. Directly asking this question to people is touchy. Other issues such as race, sex, the crime, and do they have a record of being insane or mentally retarded all play a part in a persons opinion. I hope to find the answers to all these questions when doing this report.

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The Search

My task to find out if Americans are for or against the death penalty began at the Maize Library. The class had three days to do research. The two days were spent on the Internet and the third day of 4browsing through books and magazines on the subject. I found useful information that will show how Americans feel about capital punishment

The first day in the library was my best day of researching by far. I went to the search engine Yahoo, and typed in death penalty. There were around 150 sites that were given to me. I went to the site that had the title Death Penalty Information Center. This site compared the cost of execution to imprisonment for forty years. This site also showed me facts about race being an issue in the death penalty. The information on the death penalty and race made my decision easy.

I have the Internet at home, which is a big plus for me when looking up information on the Internet. I logged on to some sites that were blocked at school by the web access denied code. This site was called theelectricchair.com. I found this site while scrolling down the list that I had already brought up from looking at the previous search engine. This site was full of facts about the costs and what people thought of capital punishment.

The second search day I tried to find out what drugs are used in lethal injection, and how many volts are used in electrocution. I wanted to know this because people are always wondering if the criminal dies a slow death or not. I could not find a single site to locate this information. I thought that this would be a common topic on many sites, but I was wrong. I ended my day by going to the search engine Google. I ran out of time and did not find anything.

My last day in the library was well used. I went to a computer to look for books. I typed in death penalty, and found around twenty books. I went to the three hundred section of the library and found the book Capital Punishment. I skimmed through the book and liked what I saw, so I took it back to my seat and read it. I found a lot of graphs that showed me what people thought about the death penalty. One graph showed that Republicans favor the death penalty ten percent more than Democrats. This book gave me the most information on whether or not Americans are for or against the death penalty.

Since we had no more days in the library, I called a man that my parents know, Mike Myers. He is the Assistant Warden at the El Dorado Federal Correctional Facility. I felt like he was qualified for the interview because he has nineteen years experience. He told me what he does on a regular basis and his views on the death penalty. He considers the death penalty appropriate in certain cases.

The Find

The easiest information I found was whether or not a state allows the death penalty and what method they use for execution. "Twelve states do not allow the death penalty, and thirty-eight states allow it" (Peacenet's ). States that allow the death penalty use one of five methods lethal injection, firing squad, hanging, electric chair, or lethal gas (Peacenet's 1). In California lethal gas was abolished in 17 because it violated two Amendments (Rein 4). Hanging can only take place in two states, Montana and Washington. Americans can still not decide on the most humane way to execute a prisoner.

There is a wide variety of people on death row. "1 states enforce the death penalty at age 16 or less" (Rein 47). A controversial topic is should we execute mentally challenged people? Most people say it depends on if the accused is already diagnosed as mental before the trial. "Thirteen states forbid the executions of mentally retarded people" (Halperin 1). When a person is convicted of murder, eleven out of one hundred are innocent (Rein 7). This statistic is critical when deciding to put someone to death because you could be killing one of the eleven.

The information that surprises me the most is the cost of the death penalty process. "Florida spends . million dollars on each death row inmate, compared to $55, 000 for an average of forty years to life sentence" (ElectricChair 1). This money could go to a number of things. We could repair roads or build new schools. '"If you add or of these in a row, that can put you in a million dollar hole"' (Death 4). I am not sure that people are aware of these figures. "It cost Georgia $00,000 for a death penalty case" (Death 4). This is one of the highest prices for a court case; this does not include the killing and other various costs. In Texas, the cost of imprisonment is three times less than the death penalty over a forty-year span (Death 1). Texas has the most executions a year and has the most prisoner also. This will add up very quickly for the people in Texas.

The subject that is one of the biggest issues in America is race. It is also a controversy in the courtroom. Not enough jurors of this minority, or to many for this one. "In Texas, in 11 blacks made up twelve percent of the population, but forty-eight percent of the prison population and fifty-five percent of those on death row were black."

(ElectricChair 1). These statistics point to one of two ideas. Either black people are being wrongfully accused or they are actually committing more crimes. I personally do not know which is correct. Out of the four major races on death row this is how they compare. "Since 176, eighty percent of death penalty victims are white, fourteen percent are black, four percent Hispanics, and two percent Asians" (Race ). I do not know who is getting a bad deal when you go to court, but if they do God be with them. A black man who kills a white man is eleven more times likely to receive the death penalty than a white man killing a black man. (ElectricChair 1) I am sure these statistics are not given when polling people about the death penalty.

The information that proves if Americans are for or against capital punishments is in statistics. "In 165 thirty-eight percent believed in it and forty-seven percent opposed it and fifteen percent were not sure. In 1 seventy-one percent of people polled believe in it and twenty-one percent oppose it and eight percent were not sure" (Rein 76). This is a big jump over forty years. Either Americans were overcome by a sense of killing or they thought that justice should be served. When is comes to the gender point of view males show that they are all right with killing. "In 1 seventy-five percent of males believe in it and twenty percent oppose of it. Females were sixty-six percent for it and twenty-three percent against it" (Rein 77). Has the government handled the death penalty appropriately? "In 1 twenty-five percent said to often, sixty-four said not often enough, and four percent said right amount " (Rein 78). Is the United States the only country to use the death penalty? No, there are very many countries that use it. Argentina, Portugal, Italy, Greece, and Hong Kong forbid executions for all laws broken (Rein 8). Even though these countries do not allow the death penalty I am sure that do some kind of torture.

The Conclusion

Based on the facts and statistics I have found it should make it easy to answer my question. With the information that I have now I will answer my question, " Are Americans for or against the death penalty?" My personal point of view has changed throughout the search. Cost has changed my view. At first I was for the death penalty totally, but now I am not for it as much as I was before. For the Americans point of view I found out that about seven out of ten people polled believe in the death penalty.

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