Lately a few horrendous cases have brought capital punishment back into the foreground of our consciousness. Virginia, for example, recently executed convicted rapist/murderer Paul Powell for his heinous 1999 crimes. In another case from the Mid-Atlantic region, a mother had admitted killing two of her daughters and keeping their bodies in a freezer; her case ended two days ago with a life sentence, but doesn't it sound like a good one for the death penalty?
It's trendy to oppose capital punishment, but I have to admit that I don't see a problem. Other than a general soft-heartedness about "taking a human life," (and by the way the surviving victim of rape/murder in the linked article above tells us that she was against the death penalty -- but is in favor of it now) most of the objections to legal execution don't hold water.
Fairness? To me it seems only fair that anyone who wittingly takes a life should be expected to give up his own (the exceptions are for cases where death was not intended, or accidental; or for perpetrators who couldn't tell right from wrong (and these are rare). Insanity or mental instability might, or might not, disqualify -- it depends. Absent evidence that criminally psychotic cases are curable, what benefit does society reap from "sparing" such people for a life at government expense?
Concern for executing the wrong person? Conceivably that could occur but many of the historical cases that opponents point to happened because of racist indifference to the niceties of evidence, rather than failures of the judicial system per se. At any rate, in the age of DNA and other forensic evidence, I believe that likelihood of a mistake in future is increasingly slim.
Religious principles? Hardly. Through history, nearly all major major religions have condoned or even encouraged, at one point of another, the murder of "infidels" and "heretics." Moreover, both the Bible and the revered fundamental texts of other major religions provide us the well-known "eye for an eye" motto. Capital punishment IS a religious principle.
Doesn't fit the crime? In fact, it's completely justifiable to apply the death penalty in lesser crimes than murder. Crimes of extreme senseless violence, rape, torture, brutality, and the like qualify easily, especially when the offense is repeated, although in these cases courts and juries need to have the flexibility to sort out the finer points of the circumstances. We need the concept of "cruel and unusual" applied to the injury and suffering of victims.
In short, the death penalty operates effectively for society in a number of ways. It may not deter the commission of crimes in most cases, but it does reduce the costs to society of trying and supporting such offenders; it provides victims and their families a measure of consolation; and as the old saw goes (cynical but true) it prevents recidivism.
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