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The Death Penalty Should be Abolished.

*Counterarguments* ~Contention 1~ Again, you make the misconception that the death penalty is mainly about economic benefit, or deterrence effect, THOUGH those points could be argued. The main reason why a death penalty is instated is not because it's a "solution" to crime, but because it is justice or deontological you could say. a. Immanuel Kant's categorical imperative is famously summarized as "act only according to that maxim whereby you can at the same time will that it should become a universal law." A crime is a violation of social law, of the society in which the person observes. By committing a murder or another heinous crime, the criminal universalized his action, and thus they lose the right to be members of the society and need to be punished. Kant has two conceptions of crime; private and a social crime. A private crime is like deceiving a person to gain personal goods, while a social crime is like theft or murder. The difference is that social crimes affects society, while private crimes affect a person; though the severity of both are not different. However, for social crimes it is up to society, to government, that this be punished. b. A crime shouldn't be punished on basis of social benefit, THOUGH one could argue, points such as deterrence are still valid. The main point of death penalty however, should lie in moral absolutism: this is the foundation of human rights. If we were to punish people based on societal benefit, then this could justify punishing innocent people if doing such will benefit society. c. In a crude interpretation, you could conceive of this argument as an "eye for an eye". By most accounts this is valid, but do remember the notion of retributive justice; the punishment must be proportionate to the crime. The corresponding punishment for murder is the death penalty. The right to life is the most basic and fundamental right to humans; life no matter how bad is more preferable to death (Kant explains this by illustrating the example of suicide). By violating this right, your own right is discarded. d. A system of laws that fails to punish criminals is weak, and since laws are what create a society, the society in turn is weak. This is why punishment must be dealt out; it would undermine the moral values to not otherwise. ~Contention 2~ Now deriving from my counterargument in contention 1, it is valid to completely discard this economic notion. 1. For the sake of argument, let's say your statistic are correct. a. Prisoners can and often do kill others in the prison system. b. 70% of criminals released from prison in California come return to the prison for another offense. [1] c. When dealing with the DP, extra measures should be taken to ensure accurate rulings. Remember, my argument from the philosophy of Kant means that arguments from economics are irrelevant. Social benefit isn't the reason for justice. This is the nature of deontological ethics. "Haha, yeah a murderer will never commit a crime again when punished with the death penalty, because he or she is deprived of the life in which crimes can be committed. My opponent appears to be getting back at me for a debate in which I brought up semantics and technicalities and won." -I can't see where my opponent is getting at. This point is valid; murders will almost always be murders. Statistics show that released or escaped murders to kill more, and with he advent of the death penalty, this can be solved. YET again, I do want to stress the importance of my first argument; from Kantian ethics. Social benefit is never part of the case. "A rapist isn't punished with rape. Following that logic, a murderer should not be punished with murder. See how the "eye for an eye" punishment is so profoundly illogical?" -Right to life is a fundamental liberty of all humans. To break it is to jeopardize your own. Rape can be consolidated in other terms. ~Contention 4 (it should actually be 3)~ Unjust usage of the law does not undermine the death penalties principles. You have failed to show how increasing court appointed attorney's salaries is difficult, and how the law being fallible is relevant to the death penalty's validity. Just because we don't have a perfect or a more ideal system of laws does not mean the DP should not be instated. As it stands right now, it is morally correct. ==> Important Note <== If my argument with Kantian ethics still stand, then all my opponent's points should be discarded. This is the crux of my argument, and I encourage my opponent to entail his main concern with it. If it remains to be justified by the end of this debate, then things such as economic benefit aren't relevant, as I have explained in Kantian ethics such things are never part of the case.