No more last meals for the condemned in Texas
On 25/09/2011 1:10 AM, Cheryl wrote:
> On 9/24/2011 8:52 PM, Dave Smith wrote:
>> On 24/09/2011 8:39 PM, Cheryl wrote:
>>> On 9/23/2011 5:30 PM, Doug Freyburger wrote:
>>>
>>>> I'm pretty ready to lock them up after the first one. I'm more on the
>>>> fence when it comes to an absolute certainty they will never do it
>>>> again. To me it's the price. It costs more to execute someone than to
>>>> keep them locked up for life. And the chance of escape.
>>>
>>> I picked your post as a victim but I just wanted to say that while I'm
>>> not a proponent of the death penalty, I think it might have come about
>>> to give the family of the victim closure. I could be wrong. Often am.
>>
>> You may not think that i you knew the sorts of crimes for which the
>> death penalty was applied......theft, treason, cutting down trees,
>> killing chickens. In 18th century Britain, there were 222 crimes to
>> which death penalty could be applied. The US, having started off as
>> British colonies, has similar laws. In Virginia the Divine Moral and
>> Martial Laws provide death penalty for things like stealing grapes and
>> trading with Indians. In New York Duke's Laws the death penatly could be
>> applied to a person who struck their mother or father, and for denying
>> the "true God"
>
> That's all very interesting and barbaric, but I was thinking of the
> death penalty for murder. It's hard to believe in the death penalty for
> cutting down trees or theft.
>
You may well have been thinking that, but you thought the death penalty
may have come about to give the family closure, a term and a concept
that was not even known a century ago. Depending on the circumstances,
homicide was often considered a lesser crime than theft. In days gone
by, someone might be hanged stealing a loaf of bread but get a fine for
killing someone.
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