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    Centuries of Controversy

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    homayoon

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    Centuries of Controversy

    Uploaded by

    homayoon
    14 views1 page

    Original Title

    CRC (11)

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    14 views1 page

    Centuries of Controversy

    Uploaded by

    homayoon

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    © All Rights Reserved
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    Download as pdf or txt
    of 1

    Overview

    had committed. But the jury disagreed, ruling that Spisak had willfully
    committed murder and deserved the death penalty. Even though he filed
    appeals that spanned nearly three decades, the death sentence continued
    to be upheld, and Spisak’s time eventually ran out. After his execution,
    Warford’s mother said in a statement: “I can finally say justice has been
    served. If one can say this brings closure, I can say it is peace of mind for
    me and my family.”2

    Centuries of Controversy
    The death penalty, also known as capital punishment, has been used
    for thousands of years as the ultimate punishment for crimes. Although
    historians have no way of knowing how long the death penalty has been
    an issue of controversy, they do know that it has been debated for cen-
    turies. In writings from the 1700s, several influential Europeans were
    clear about their contempt for capital punishment. One was the Ital-
    ian criminologist and philosopher Cesare Beccaria, who published an
    essay in 1767 entitled Of Crimes and Punishments. Beccaria condemned
    the death penalty as a barbarous practice, saying that intentionally put-

    “
    ting someone to death, even if the
    person had committed crimes, was
    unjustified. He wrote: “What right,
    Although histori-
    I ask, have men to cut the throats
    ans have no way of
    of their fellow-creatures? Certainly
    knowing how long
    not that on which the sovereignty
    the death penalty
    and laws are founded.”3
    has been an issue
    The death penalty is as contro-
    of controversy,
    versial today as it was during Bec-
    they do know that
    caria’s time, and perhaps even more
    it has been debated
    so. Organizations such as Amnesty
    for centuries.

    ”
    International and the National
    Coalition to Abolish the Death
    Penalty denounce capital punish-
    ment as an inhumane practice that must end. But many disagree, argu-
    ing that people who intentionally commit murder deserve to be put to
    death for their crimes. According to an October 2010 Gallup poll, this
    is the perspective of the majority of people in the United States. When
    asked if they were in favor of the death penalty for a person convicted of

    11

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