California Should Object to Proposition 34

死刑是人类历史上最古老的刑罚也是剥夺罪犯生命的最严厉的惩罚。据报道，加州是美国判处死刑最多的城市。在这种状态下，圣昆廷是锁定了被判处死刑的囚犯最大的机构。目前，关于由死刑带来了许多弊端，超过50万人在美国加州签署通过投票要求死刑的废除。然后，在死刑名单的囚犯将被判处终身监禁并从事监狱内的工作。因此，本文的目的是提出一些支持的意见，反对34号提案，并对死刑提供相关的观点。

Death penalty is the most ancient punishment in human history and it is also the harshest punishment of depriving the criminals’ life. It is reported that California is the state that has the most number of executions throughout the United States. In this state, San Quentin is the the largest institution to lock up prisoners under sentence of death. At present, concerning many disadvantages brought by death penalty, over 500000 people in California have signed to request the abolishment of death penalty through voting. Then those prisoners in the death penalty list would be sentenced to life imprisonment and engaged in the work within prisons. However, according to one recent death penalty referendum, it shows that about 56% populace in California object to Proposition 34 which could lead to the abrogation of death penalty. As a result, the purpose of this essay is to present certain supportive opinions on the opposition to Proposition 34 and provide related perspectives towards death penalty. 

Firstly, it is the deterrent force of death penalty. Since death penalty greatly increases the crime cost so that it has obvious deterrence function to capital felony and acts as a warning to others. One typical example is that the legislative institutions of both Papua New Guinea and Vietnam formally decide to recover the execution of death penalty, which aims to hold back the upward tendency of violent crimes (Kandola & Egan, 2014). Besides, according to another careful measuring economic analysis, it reveals that executing a person can frighten 18 murderers (Kandola & Egan, 2014). Thus it can be seen the deterrent force of death penalty can not be underestimated and then Proposition 34 should be opposed. 

Secondly, it is the issue of human rights between prisoners under sentence of death and victims. Some opinion has indicated that the human right of criminals is equivalent to that of victims. However, when paying close attention to criminals’ human right, people have ignored the victims’ human rights. Besides, the interest  that criminals lose should be more than what they encroach on. The life right of the prisoners under sentence of death should not overtop all the moral values and become the only standard of measuring human rights (McFerrin & Adkisson, 2012). Thus death penalty is in need and Proposition 34 should not be passed. 

Thirdly, it is the cost comparison between death penalty and life imprisonment. When focusing on the heavy cost of the death penalty appeals, people just forget the fact that the cost of the board and lodging and management of life imprisonment are much heavier than that of death penalty appeals. And it must be burdened by all the national taxpayers. Since national fiscal is the taxpayers’ property, advocating for having an obligation to provide for permanent isolation prisoners doesn’t conform to the rationality of the national system (Fogel, et al., 2014). Especially when prisoners are without remorse and regret and meanwhile they must be insulated from the society all their life, then making offerings to such kind people is just the meaningless behavior of wasting national resources. Thus death penalty is necessary and passing Proposition 34 would lead to certain disadvantages. 

Fourthly, it is the execution of death penalty and the introspection of prisoners under sentence of death. The significance of death penalty is to make criminals who committed the murder honestly in the face of mistakes made by themselves and meanwhile reflect on those mistaken behaviors from their heart. In fact, ruthlessly seizing others’ precious lives is indeed the very cruel things. Relatively, only at that time can those criminals truly feel that others’ lives are also precious and priceless. Thus the meaning of death penalty is not reprisal, but the way to let criminals realize their own rascality. On the other hand, as for people supporting death penalty, they actually pay much more attention on the life value because they know life is valuable (McFerrin & Adkisson, 2012). Therefore they support the harshest punishment so as to crack down on those people who mutilate others’ lives. If Proposition 34 is passed, those criminals would not have deep self-examination towards what they did.

Fifthly, it is sense of the execution of death penalty towards the families of the victims. Some opinions point that giving economy comfort to prisoners under sentence of death and their families. However, those opinions have forgotten the rights and interests of victims’ families. Then death penalty could be a kind of comfort towards victims’ families and make them psychologically produce a sense of balance (Fogel, et al., 2014). Thus Proposition 34 should be against.   

Finally, the risk of the execution of the innocent is in fact very little, especially when distinguishing the innocent legally and the one practically. The possibility of executing those who don’t kill people is very little.  

In conclusion, due to the above demonstration towards six supportive opinions on the opposition to Proposition 34, the significance of death penalty is very distinct so that California should object to Proposition 34. 

References 
Fogel, S. et al. (2014) ‘A Critical Examination of the “White Victim Effect” and Death Penalty Decision-Making from a Propensity Score Matching Approach: The North Carolina Experience’, Journal of Criminal Justice, 42, 5, 384-398. 

Kandola, S. & Egan, V. (2014) ‘Individual differences underlying attitudes to the death penalty’, Personality and Individual Differences, 1, 4, 48-53. 

McFerrin, R. & Adkisson, R. (2012) ‘Analysis of California propositions: An experiment in the empirical revelation of shared mental models’, The Social Science Journal, 49, 4, 465-475. 



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