Why the death penalty?

By: Adam Kozman, Opinion Editor

This week in Tennessee, death row inmate, Christa Pike, received and survived two lethal injections. The governor, Bill Lee, pauses the planned “execution” for the time being while she is being hospitalized.

Upon reading all these various headlines talking about the situation, it was odd seeing the word “execution” used so freely. Multiple news sources are writing about the execution attempt of this person, the failure of this execution and the effort of another execution to serve as a punishment for a crime she committed in 1995. 

The whole idea of execution seems so aged, like the French in the 1800s using the guillotine to chop heads off for political revolution. The idea of execution is something that is coupled with angry mobs or barbaric groups. But we live in an economical civilization with laws, with infrastructure, a form of elected officials and various government run programs for the people. I would like to think that we live in a more advanced civilization than that of one that goes and angrily executes people. 

However, I understand that it’s not the regular person being executed nowadays, it’s the criminal. The criminals who commit capital offenses like murder, treason and espionage, offenses that should not go unpunished. I also understand that the death penalty is outlawed in 23 states. It’s disarming that so many states have it outlawed, but more than half of the states in the country still keep their right to execute criminals. 

What further justice is served by executing the criminal than a life sentence in jail? We don’t live in the time of exodus, where an eye for an eye is the way of justice. We live in a time of diplomacy and morals.