My stand on the issue

Death Penalty-Time for Reform

Nowadays, flipping through T.V. channels, you can see many C.S.I episodes and different Law & Order series; watching those channels, you will hear terms such as “the due process,” “double jeopardy,” so on and so forth. Needless to say, those terms come from the Bill of Rights which had been included in the nation’s Constitution to protect its people, even the accused. However, as it turned out, the Bill of Rights alone cannot protect people from wrongful conviction. There is news such as, in March 2009, Ronald Cotton was freed after being exonerated by DNA testing; he was convicted and served 11 years in prison for a rape he did not commit (Steve Weinberg); that kind of news scares people to think about not only if the wrongful conviction happens to them but also what will happen if the wrongful sentencing is irreversible. In other word, the death penalty can mistakenly kill innocent people. Such notion is one of many factors that have triggered and fueled the debate about death penalty for years. On one hand, supporters of the death penalty, such as Jessica Chau, my teammate, has focused on the deterrence and retribution effects of it; On the other hand, critic of the death penalty insisted, "The death penalty violates religious beliefs about killing" (Gail B. Stewart). There even are people on the fence about the death penaly, such as Joan Thift-Walton, my teammate: she wonders if the death penalty violates the eight amendment of the Constitution of the U.S. in being cruel and usual punishment. For me, although I have mixed feelings about the death penalty,too, my reason is different from Joan's : I strongly believe that its current practice is ineffective because of racial bias in sentencing. As racial bias is one of many indicators that the criminal justice system does not properly do its job, I call for a reform in the system.

Work Cited


Stewart, Gail B. "Introduction to The Death Penalty: Opposing Viewpoints Digests." Opposing Viewpoints Digests: The Death Penalty. San Diego: Greenhaven Press ( 1998). Opposing Viewpoints Resource Center. Gale.Web. 3 Sept. 2009

Weinberg, S. “Wrongful convictions.” CQ Researcher 19 (2009): 345-372. CQ Researcher Online. Web. 1 Sep. 2009.