Deconstructing the Efficiency of the Death Penalty in Modern Times

Avery LeVan

ENGL 138T: Rhetoric and Civic Life

Professor J. Babcock

12 April 2019
 Abstract

The death penalty is a very controversial issue in the United States. The flawed justice

system of the United States, combined with society’s efforts to be more humane, does not

allow the death penalty to be an effective means of deterring crime. The death penalty is an

extremely expensive form of punishment due to the many additional hearings and reviews that

take place in order go through with the sentencing and execution. This results in prolonging the

prisoner’s incarceration, thereby making the process even more expensive. Death sentences

tend to clutter the judicial system, all while there is no credible evidence to suggest that there

exists a correlation between the death penalty and homicide rates. The death penalty is not a

punishment that is suited for modern times and should be abolished immediately.

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 Intro:

Of the possible sentences one may receive in a court of law, the death sentence is one

of the most controversial. Today in the United States, 30 of the 50 states still give themselves

the option to sentence a convicted person to death. i Many people say that the death penalty is

a necessary deterrent of crime, while others believe that the death penalty is immoral, or that

the government should not have the power to put its subjects to death. The truth is that,

setting arguments of immorality aside, the death penalty is horribly ineffective at doing what it

is supposedly intended to do. The United States’ flawed justice system, combined with society’s

efforts to be more humane, does not allow the death penalty to be an effective means of

deterring crime. The United States should ban capital punishment entirely.

Figure 1: "30 States with the Death Penalty and 20 States with Death Penalty Bans.” ProCon.org, 13 March 2019. Web. 14
April 2019

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 History

For thousands of years, the death penalty has been viewed as a viable form of

punishment for committing a crime, dating back to some of the earliest human civilizations. The

first established death penalty laws can be traced back to the Code of King Hammurabi of

Babylon in the eighteenth century B.C.E.ii For the next few millennia, death sentences would be

carried out by crucifixion, burning alive, beating to death, drowning, and impalement, among

other forms of punishment.iii In the past one thousand years, executions became increasingly

more spectacular, most notably in countries like Great Britain and France, where popular

means of execution included boiling, burning at the stake, drawing and quartering, beheading,

and hanging.iv

For the first 200 years of the United States’ existence as a country, hanging was by far

the most popular method of execution, killing over 9,000 people in U.S. history.v That was until

a device known as the electric chair was invented in the late 1800s, replacing hanging as

America’s primary execution method. The infamous electric chair became a pop culture icon in

The United States, executing nearly half the amount of people in 70 years as hanging did in 250

years.vi In the 1960s, however, the electric chair became phased out, and was replaced by lethal

injection, which was thought to be more humane. vii Lethal injection is when the state injects a

lethal dose of drugs into the bloodstream of a convicted individual with the intention to put

them to death. Some states have protocols that require two, or even three different types of

drugs to be administered in order to ensure death. Lethal injection has remained the primary

method of execution for the past 40 years in the United States.viii

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Figure 2: "Every Execution in U.S. History in a Single Chart.” Time USA, LLC, 2019. Web. 14 April 2019.

Costs of Execution

Many proponents of the death penalty argue that taxpayers should not have to waste

their money to put heinous criminals behind bars for the rest of their lives when the state could

just execute them and not pay any further costs. However, the reality is that the cost of putting

someone to death is far greater than the cost of paying for someone to spend their life in

prison. For example, it costs Texas an average of $2.3 million per death penalty case, about

three times the cost of imprisoning someone in a single cell at the highest security level for 40

years.ix Likewise, it costs Maryland approximately three million dollars per death penalty case

that results in a death sentence, costing taxpayers a total of $186 million between 1978 and

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1999. Only five executions were actually carried out during that time.x In these cases, the death

penalty is clearly demonstrated to be a very costly and wasteful practice.

The reason why the cost is so high is because whenever the death penalty is sought,

many additional hearings and reviews have to take place in order go through with the

sentencing and execution. “The greatest costs associated with the death penalty occur prior to

and during trial, not in post-conviction proceedings. Even if all post-conviction proceedings

(appeals) were abolished, the death penalty would still be more expensive than alternative

sentences.”xi The most expensive part is not necessarily the execution itself, nor the post-

conviction appeals. Rather, it is the costs of trial that make the death penalty so expensive.

An additional cost to be considered in the death penalty process is the costs of the time

that prisoners wait on death row to be executed. The average time that prisoners spend on

death row has steadily increased over the past four decades, from roughly six years in the

1980s to sixteen years in 2011. xii Some prisoners have waited so long on death row due to the

complexities of the legal system that officials have argued that these prisoners are essentially

serving a “double sentence” by serving upwards of 20 years in prison, and then being executed.

If they are going to be spending that long in prison anyway, why go through all of the additional

cost to put them to death? These long incarceration times spark increasing legal debate, which

then delays the execution time even longer and increases the prisoner’s incarceration time

even further, thus drastically increasing the cost of the entire process. xiii Long incarceration

times and extensive legal battles are the reason why the cost of the death-sentencing process is

so ridiculously expensive. The death penalty is too expensive to be justified as a viable form of

punishment in the United States.

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Figure 3: "Time on Death Row." Death Penalty Information Center, 2019. Web. 14 April 2019.

Flaws in The Justice System

A large, but largely unnoticed aspect of the death penalty process is the strain that

death sentences put on a bureaucracy. There are flaws in the justice system that render the

death penalty too costly to enforce. For example, the justice system lacks the ability to

consistently and promptly employ swift executions. This is shown by the speed at which the

justice system operates when handling capital punishment cases. As stated previously, the

average time that an inmate waits on death row is about sixteen years as of 2011.xiv The reason

the process is so slow is because of the extensive procedures that are required when dealing

with cases that involve the death penalty.

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 A considerable time between the imposition of the death sentence and the actual

execution is unavoidable, given the procedural safeguards required by the courts in

capital cases. Starting with selecting the trial jury, murder trials take far longer when the

ultimate penalty is involved. Furthermore, post-conviction appeals in death-penalty

cases are far more frequent than in other cases. These factors increase the time and

cost of administering criminal justice. xv

The justice system is not perfect; it can only do so much in a given amount of time with a given

amount of resources. So far, only 15% of death sentences that have been imposed since 1976

have been carried out.xvi This goes to demonstrate how much of a burden the death penalty is

on this system. It has taken over 40 years for the government to execute one in every fifteen

individuals it had been charged with executing. Clearly these bureaucracies are struggling to

achieve anything resembling efficiency. Death penalty cases clutter this system and take time

and effort away from other important matters that require the system’s attention. If the death

penalty were abolished, it would be a burden lifted off of the justice system, which would allow

them to operate more swiftly and efficiently in dealing with other cases.

Effects on Crime

It is a common argument by supporters of the death penalty that the threat of being put

to death is a necessary deterrent for crime. The logic is that, if people know they can be put to

death for committing a certain crime, they will think twice about committing it, or not commit

the crime at all. While this idea seems to make sense, it remains largely unsupported by facts or

evidence. In 2012, the National Research Council was tasked with finding out if there was any

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credible evidence to suggest that capital punishment deters homicides. After conducting the

study, they concluded that no such credible evidence existed.xvii There is actually evidence that

would rather suggest that the death penalty does not lower homicide rates at all.

In adjacent states – one with the death penalty and the other without it – the state that

practices the death penalty does not always show a consistently lower rate of criminal

homicide. For example, between l990 and l994, the homicide rates in Wisconsin and Iowa

(non-death-penalty states) were half the rates of their neighbor, Illinois – which restored

the death penalty in l973, and by 1994 had sentenced 223 persons to death and carried

out two executions. Between 2000-2010, the murder rate in states with capital

punishment was 25-46% higher than states without the death penalty. xviii

Figure 4: Deterrence: States Without the Death Penalty Have Had Consistently Lower Murder Rates.” Death Penalty
Information Center, 2019. Web. 14 April 2019.

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Based on these statistics it would seem that there is not a correlation that between homicide

rates and whether that state offers the death penalty or not. Many death-penalty states even

have a higher murder rate that non-death-penalty states. In the case of Wisconsin, Iowa, and

Illinois, all three states occupy roughly the same geographic region, yet still had a stark

difference in homicide rates between 2000 and 2010. This suggests that murder rate is not

affected by death penalty laws, and therefore dispels the claim that the death penalty serves as

an effective crime deterrent. A 2009 study published in the Journal of Criminal Law and

Criminology also supports this, finding that 88% of the top criminologists in the United States

do not believe that the death penalty is an effective preventative measure to homicide.xix This

shows that the great majority of leading expert opinion in the United States does not support

the death penalty. Not only does the death penalty as a deterrent lack the statistics to support

itself, but it also lacks expert support.

Capital Punishment’s Decline

Internationally, support for capital punishment has been declining in the past 50 years,

with many western countries banning the death penalty altogether.

In the 1950s, public sentiment began to turn away from capital punishment. Many allied

nations either abolished or limited the death penalty, and in the U.S., the number of

executions dropped dramatically. Whereas there were 1,289 executions in the 1940s,

there were 715 in the 1950s, and the number fell even further, to only 191, from 1960

to 1976. In 1966, support for capital punishment reached an all-time low. A Gallup poll

showed support for the death penalty at only 42%. xx

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Why does the United States still need the death penalty when the already steady decline of the

death penalty suggests that it does not? Society as a whole is straying away from the death

penalty as there are slowly realizing its inefficiency.

Conclusion

If the purpose of the death penalty is to deter homicides and remove unwanted felons

from society, it does not do a very good job of it. There is no evidence that the death penalty

affects homicide rates, and the government takes painstakingly long amounts of time to carry

out its executions. The death penalty has turned into an extremely costly and ineffective

method of punishment which is not fit for this day and age. Society cannot continue attempting

to be more humane in its practices while still upholding a death penalty and expecting it to be

effective. The death penalty cannot be effective and humane at the same time without a sizable

societal cost.

Instead of putting up with the enormous costs of the death penalty, the United States

should use that taxpayer money that is currently being wasted and invest it into other crime-

preventative measures that are proven to work. Why can the United States not just put

convicts in jail for life without parole instead of executing them? A life-in-prison sentence is far

more cost effective than a death sentence, and it is far less of a headache to deal with in court.

There is no need to go through the costly procedure of putting someone to death when there

are many more less expensive and equally effective punishments at the government’s disposal.

The time, effort, and money that is wasted annually on upholding the death penalty could be

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utilized more effectively elsewhere. The United States must abolish the death penalty and start

using taxpayer money to fund penal measures that are proven to work.

i “30 States with the Death Penalty and 20 States with Death Penalty Bans.”

deathpenalty.procon.org. Procon.org, 13 March 2019,

https://deathpenalty.procon.org/view.resource.php?resourceID=001172

ii
“Part I: History of the Death Penalty.” deathpenaltyinfo.org. Death Penalty Information

Center, 2019, https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/part-i-history-death-penalty

iii Ibid.

iv
Ibid.

v Wilson, Chris. “Every Execution in U.S. History in a Single Chart.” time.com. Time USA, LLC.,

2019, http://time.com/82375/every-execution-in-u-s-history-in-a-single-chart/

vi Ibid.

vii Ibid.

viii “Lethal Injection.” deathpenaltyinfo.org. Death Penalty Information Center, 2019,

https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/lethal-injection

ix “Facts About the Death Penalty.” supremecourt.gov. Death Penalty Information Center, 7

December 2016, https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/URLs_Cited/OT2016/16-5247/16-

5247-2.pdf

x Ibid.

xi “Death Penalty Cost.” amnestyusa.org. Amnesty International, 2019,

https://www.amnestyusa.org/issues/death-penalty/death-penalty-facts/death-penalty-cost/

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xii McFarland, Torin. “The Death Penalty vs Life Incarceration: A Financial Analysis.”

Susquehanna University Political Review: Vol. 7, Article 4, 2016,

https://scholarlycommons.susqu.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1026&context=supr

xiii Ibid.

xiv Ibid.

xv “The Case Against The Death Penalty.” aclu.org. ACLU, 2019,

https://www.aclu.org/other/case-against-death-penalty

xvi Nagin, Daniel S.; Pepper, John V. “Deterrence and the Death Penalty.” nap.edu. The National

Academy of Sciences, 2019, https://www.nap.edu/read/13363/chapter/5#41

xvii
“Deterrence and the Death Penalty.” deathpenaltyinfo.org. The National Academies, 18 April

2012, https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/documents/NatResCouncil-Deterr.pdf

xviii “The Case Against The Death Penalty.”

xix Radelet, Michael L.; Lacock, Traci L. “Do Executions Lower Homicide Rates: The Views of

Leading Criminologists.” Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology: Vol. 99, Article 4, 2009,

https://scholarlycommons.law.northwestern.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=7323&context=jc

lc

xx “Part I: History of the Death Penalty.”

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