The Death Penalty and Capital Punishment: Moral, Legal, and Empirical Debates
Bachelor's Thesis · ~76 pages · English
Abstract
This thesis examines the death penalty through three analytical lenses: moral philosophy, constitutional law, and empirical social science. The philosophical analysis evaluates retributivist, consequentialist, and human rights arguments for and against capital punishment, finding that evolving standards of human dignity provide the most robust normative foundation for abolition. Legal analysis traces the development of Eighth Amendment jurisprudence through landmark Supreme Court cases. Empirical review of 50 years of deterrence research finds no consistent evidence that capital punishment reduces homicide rates, while substantial evidence documents wrongful convictions, racial and socioeconomic disparities in application, and irreversible error.
1. Introduction
Capital punishment remains one of the most contested issues in criminal justice, combining profound moral questions about the state's right to take human life with empirical debates about deterrence, justice, and error. The United States remains the only Western democracy that continues to execute criminals, placing it alongside authoritarian regimes in its use of this ultimate sanction.
This thesis examines the death penalty debate across philosophical, legal, and empirical dimensions, drawing on historical analysis, constitutional case law, and social science research to build a comprehensive assessment.
2. Moral and Legal Frameworks
The philosophical debate involves competing frameworks:
Retributivism - Justice requires that offenders receive punishment proportionate to their crimes; the most heinous crimes may warrant the most extreme punishment. Critics question whether death proportionally matches any crime in a morally coherent system.
Consequentialism - Capital punishment is justified if it deters future murders more effectively than life imprisonment. The empirical evidence for this claim is examined in Part 3.
Human Rights Framework - Evolving international consensus holds that execution constitutes cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment under international human rights law, regardless of the crime committed.
Constitutional Development - From Furman v. Georgia (1972) through Atkins v. Virginia (2002) and Roper v. Simmons (2005), the Court has progressively narrowed capital punishment's application.
3. Empirical Evidence
Review of 50 years of deterrence research reveals:
• No consistent evidence that states with capital punishment have lower homicide rates than states without • The National Research Council (2012) concluded that existing deterrence studies contain fundamental flaws and should not inform policy • Since 1973, 190 death row exonerations have been recorded, revealing a significant wrongful conviction rate • Black defendants convicted of killing white victims are substantially more likely to receive death sentences than white defendants convicted of equivalent crimes • Execution costs exceed life imprisonment costs by $1-3 million per case due to mandatory appellate review
These empirical findings, combined with philosophical arguments, support a strong case for abolition.
References
- [1]Bedau, H. A., and P. G. Cassell, eds. Debating the Death Penalty: Should America Have Capital Punishment? Oxford University Press, 2004.
- [2]Donohue, J. J., and J. Wolfers. "Uses and Abuses of Empirical Evidence in the Death Penalty Debate." Stanford Law Review 58.3 (2005): 791-846.
- [3]National Research Council. Deterrence and the Death Penalty. National Academies Press, 2012.
- [4]Baldus, D. C., C. Pulaski, and G. Woodworth. "Comparative Review of Death Sentences: An Empirical Study of the Georgia Experience." Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology 74.3 (1983): 661-753.
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