Can Capital Punishment be justified in todays world?

Capital punishment, which refers to the act of sentencing a convict

to death, has been in existence as long as there has been crime and
laws. The death penalty serves as the ultimate punishment a state
can impose on an individual, and is traditionally reserved for crimes
that are particularly serious and heinous, such as murder, rape or
treason.
However, in todays world where there is increased emphasis on
justice, liberty and individual rights, it is my opinion that the death
penalty is no longer justified because it is both principally unsound
and unfeasible as a matter of practice.
Everyone has the right to life, liberty and security of person.
Such are the exact words enscribed on Article 3 of the Universal
Declaration of Human Rights that was established by United Nations
General Assembly. It is shocking then, that many of the countries
that practice capital punishment are the same countries that played
a central role in drafting this article. The death penalty is an outright
violation of an individuals liberties and right to live because it
involves the state forcibly terminating and individuals life against
his free will. Such a practice of state-sanctioned murder is also
unjustified and unprincipled because it violates the sanctity of life.
The state played no part in the creation of an individuals life, how
then can it be allowed to power to decide on when and how it should
be terminated?
Some proponents of capital punishment believe that the death
penalty is justified because it is a form of retributive justice, where
the criminal deserves to die because he has committed an equally
horrendous act such as murder or rape. In my opinion, the concept
of retributive punishment is merely a euphemism for the primal
desire of revenge. Two wrongs does not make a right executing the
offender will not revive the victim, nor will it benefit society in any
way. Individuals seeking to dish out retributive justice, often the
family and close relatives of victims, merely wants to satisfy their
desire for revenge.
Capital punishment is also unjustified due to the fallibility and
inherent biaseness present in the judicial system. In the judicial
system, an individual can be sentenced to death based on the
decision of a judge or a jury. However, being a system that is
depends on human judgment and discretion, the judicial system can
never be infallible. This is because every single person, regardless of
their character or moral strength, is susceptible to biaseness,
prejudices and misjudgments. Very often, an individual may not
even be aware of his or her own biaseness and inclinations. Judges
and jurors are no different although they are presumably

individuals who possess exceptional integrity character, at the end

of the day, they are ultimately still human and are still fallible to our
common afflictions of being prejudiced and biased. Studies in
America has shown that African American convicts are 3 times as
likely to be sentenced to death to their counterparts of other races
and that prosecutors were more likely to seek a death sentence
when the race of the homicide victims are white. Because of the
fallibility of the judicial system, there is always a risk of innocent
individuals being sentenced to death for crimes they did not
commit. In such situations, the irreversible nature of the death
penalty makes it impossible to restore justice, because a life, once
taken away, can never be restored. It is towards this end that I
believe the death penalty should be abolished every innocent life
lost is one too many, and if such an imperfect form of punishment is
unable to avoid such a risk, it should arguably be abolished.
From another perspective, the death penalty is also unjustified
because of its inhumane nature. On July 2014, Clayton Lockett, an
inmate on death penalty, took 43 minutes to die after a failed
execution attempt by the Oklahama State Prison. During the
agonizing 43 minutes, Lockett writhed and convulsed in apparent
agony, even rising on an occasion to speak of the intense pain.
While some may argue that under normal circumstances, the
individual would not have felt anything because he would be
unconscious, the very fact that such an incident has not only
happened once, but at least 3 times in the past year shows that
such incidents are not isolated anomalies. Furthermore, even if the
actual execution proceeds as planned, the months and years
leading up to it is also arguably a form of psychological torture. Due
to the inefficiency of the state prison systems, hundreds of inmates
are still pending on the execution lists. These inmates live in
constant fear and uncertainty; not knowing which day would be
their last. The inhumanity of such a form psychological torture, more
than anything else, should be a reason why compassionate human
beings should call for the abolishment of capital punishment.
Last but not least, many proponents of capital punishment also cite
its ability to deter future crime as a reason to continue its practice.
However, no significant research or evidence has been produced to
justify such a claim. In this instance where the state is actively
terminating the life of an individual, the onus should rest on the
state to prove that the justification of deterrence is valid. But studies
done so far have all failed to show any causation or even correlation
between the capital punishment and crime rates. In fact, in Western
European countries where the death penalty has been abolished,
crime rates have been consistently on the decline for more than
three decades.

400 years ago, the public trials and executions of Witches were
prevalent and widely accepted as integral part of life. Proponents of
the trials similarly justified these actions using the arguments of
retributive justice and deterrence. Looking back, we cannot help but
be astounded at the foolishness and absurdity of such barbaric
actions. Capital punishment is the same as we enter a new age of
enlightenment and awareness of individual rights, I contend that
this ancient practice should be left where it best belongs in the
past as history.