| "Capital
punishment is the most premeditated of murders." -Albert Camus, French philosopher |
||||
| "I
have never heard a murderer say they thought about the death penalty
as consequence of their actions prior to committing their crimes." -Gregory Ruff, police lieutenant in Kansas |
||||
| "As
if one crime of such nature, done by a single man, acting individually,
can be expiated by a similar crime done by all men, acting collectively."
-Lewis Lawes, warden of Sing Sing prison in NY in the 1920s and 30s |
||||
| "Crime
indicates a diseased mind in the same manner that sickness and pain
do a diseased body. And as in the one case we provide hospitals for
the treatment of severe and contagious diseases, so in the other,
prisons and asylums should be provided for similar reasons."
-Iowa State Supreme Court justice in the 1840s |
||||
| "If
Moses is our lawgiver [Old Testament prophet given laws by God] at
this time let us obey him, not in part only, but wholly, and put every
Sabbath breaker, blasphemer, and adulterer to death." -Abolitionist in the 1840s |
||||
| "How
dangerous it is rashly to adopt the Mosaical institutions [Old Testament
teachings of eye for an eye]. Laws might have been proper for a tribe
of ardent barbarians wandering through the sands of Arabia which are
wholly unfit for an enlightened people of civilized and gentle manners."
-an attorney general of Pennsylvania in the 1790s |
||||
| "Imposition
of the death penalty is arbitrary and capricious. Decision of who
will live and who will die for his crime turns less on the nature
of the offense and the incorrigibility of the offender and more on
inappropriate and indefensible considerations: the political and personal
inclinations of prosecutors; the defendant's wealth, race and intellect;
the race and economic status of the victim; the quality of the defendant's
counsel; and the resources allocated to defense lawyers." -Gerald Heaney, former appellate judge |
||||
|
"To take a life when a life has been lost is revenge, not justice."
-Desmond Tutu |
||||
|
"The most glaring weakness is that no matter how efficient and
fair the DP may seem in theory, in actual practice it is primarily
inflicted upon the weak, the poor, the ignorant and minorities."
-Pat Brown, former CA governor |
||||
|
"What says
the law? You will not kill. How does it say it? By killing!"
|
||||
| "I
have yet to see a death case among the dozen coming to the Supreme
Court on eve-of-execution stay applications in which the defendant
was well represented at trial... People who are well represented at
trial do not get the death penalty." -Ruth Bader Ginsburg, US Supreme Court justice |
||||
| "When
we don't fund Child Protective Services, there are consequences for
all of us. Violence manifests itself. Mental health services in Texas
are extremely poor. The answer is not to wait until they do something
to get them help." -David Atwood, founder of Texas Coalition Against the Death Penalty |
||||
| "In
the US the overwhelming majority of those executed are psychotic,
alcoholic, drug addicted or mentally unstable. They frequently are
raised in an impoverished and abusive environment. Seldom are people
with money or prestige convicted of capital offenses, even more seldom
are they executed." -George Ryan, former Illinois Governor |
||||
| "[I
am] haunted by the demon of error - error in determining guilt and
error in determining who among the guilty deserves to die." -George Ryan, former Illinois Governor |
||||
| "The
punishment of murder by death is contrary to reason, and to the order
and happiness of society, and contrary to divine revelation."
-friend of Ben Franklin's, Dr. Rush |
||||
| "The
reality is that capital punishment in America is a lottery. It is
a punishment that is shaped by the constraints of poverty, race, geography
and local politics." -Bryan Stevenson, Death Row lawyer |
||||
| "It
can be argued that rapists deserve to be raped, that mutilators deserve
to be mutilated. Most societies, however, refrain from responding
in this way because the punishment is not only degrading to those
on whom it is imposed, but it is also degrading to the society that
engages in the same behavior as the criminals." -Stephen Bright, human rights attorney |
||||
| "I
think this country would be much better off if we did not have capital
punishment.... We cannot ignore the fact that in recent years a disturbing
number of inmates on death row have been exonerated." -John Paul Stevens, Supreme Court Justice |
||||
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |