Death Penalty Quotes - Page 12

• And so it's no surprise that people who object to the death penalty on pure moral grounds also think it has no deterrent effect, and people who like the death penalty on grounds of retribution tend to think it has deterrent effects. They like that, and they believe that. I think with climate change we're seeing very much the same thing where those who deny climate change, they don't like that, and they don't believe it.

  Cass Sunstein

  Believe, Thinking, People

  "Cass Sunstein explains why Star Wars is like America". Interview with Alex McLevy, film.avclub.com. June 2, 2016.

  4 Copy quote

  Show source

• The idea that we would raise billions of sentient animals, treat them horribly, pollute our waterways with their waste, compromise the effectiveness of our antibiotics so that they grow faster, and then slaughter them with little regard to their suffering so that we can feed off their corpses, will seem to most people unthinkably cruel and barbarous - sort of in the way that we think of medieval punishments, or Europeans today think of the death penalty.

  Dale Jamieson

  Thinking, Animal, Punishment

  Source: www.3ammagazine.com

  6 Copy quote

  Show source

• The more you look at the death penalty, that's where you see that we're actually not killing the worst of the worst. We're killing the poorest of the poor. Where actually one of the biggest determinants of who gets executed is how many resources they have to defend themselves.

  Shane Claiborne

  Looks, Killing, Poor

  Source: medium.com

  4 Copy quote

  Show source

• If you're stealing a television, that should not be the death penalty.

  Jesse Ventura

  Television, Stealing, Should

  "Former governor Jesse Ventura talks about new books ‘Marijuana Manifesto’ and ‘Shit Politicians Say,’ plus much more". Interview with Michelle Tompkins, thecelebritycafe.com. September 1, 2016.

  4 Copy quote

  Show source

• Our ancestors... purged their guilt by banishment, not death. And by so doing, they stopped that endless vicious cycle of murder and revenge.

  Euripides

  Revenge, Guilt, Murder

  Euripides (2013). “Euripides IV: Helen, The Phoenician Women, Orestes”, p.203, University of Chicago Press

  5 Copy quote

  Show source

• Capital punishment would be more effective as a preventive measure if it were administered prior to the crime.

  Woody Allen

  Funny, Humor, Punishment

  12 Copy quote

• The death penalty symbolizes whom we fear and don't fear, whom we care about and whose lives are not valid.

  Bryan Stevenson

  Care, Penalties

  21 Copy quote

• With respect to the death penalty, I believe that a majority of the Supreme Court will one day accept that when the state punishes with death, it denies the humanity and dignity of the victim and transgresses the prohibition against cruel and unusual punishment. That day will be a great day for our country, for it will be a great day for our Constitution.

  William J. Brennan

  Country, Believe, Punishment

  5 Copy quote

• 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.

  Gerald Heaney

  Teaching, Eye, Law

  6 Copy quote

• 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 E. Lawes

  Men, Acting, Done

  4 Copy quote

• The death penalty makes us all murderers.

  Dean Smith

  Penalties, Murderer

  "Dean Smith: On the Passing of a Death Penalty Abolitionist" by Dave Zirin, www.thenation.com. February 9, 2015.

  4 Copy quote

  Show source

• The penalty of death is the only one that makes an injustice absolutely irreparable; from which it follows that the existence of the death penalty implies that one is exposed to committing an irreparable injustice; from which it follows that it is unjust to establish it. This reasoning appears to us to have the force of a demonstration.

  Nicolas de Caritat, marquis de Condorcet

  Unjust, Injustice, Demonstration

  26 Copy quote

• The fanatic has the courage of his conviction and the intolerance of his courage. He is opposed to the death penalty for murder, but he would willingly have anyone electrocuted who disagreed with him on the subject.

  Thomas Bailey Aldrich

  Murder, Intolerance, Conviction

  14 Copy quote

• Remember the death penalty is murder.

  Robert Drew

  Remember, Murder, Penalties

  Robert Drew's last words before the execution by injection in Texas, August 2, 1994.

  7 Copy quote

  Show source

• I regard the death penalty as a savage and immoral institution that undermines the moral and legal foundations of society. I reject the notion that the death penalty has any essential deterrent effect on potential offenders. I am convinced that the contrary is true - that savagery begets only savagery.

  Andrei Sakharov

  Foundation, Essentials, Savages

  54 Copy quote

• If you are deemed insane, then all actions that would oherwise prove you are not do, in actuality, fall into the framework of an insane person’s actions. Your sound protests constitute denial. Your valid fears are deemed paranoia. Your survival instincts are labeled defense mechanisms. It’s a no-win situation. It’s a death penalty really.

  Dennis Lehane

  Fall, Winning, Insane Person

  8 Copy quote

• Our legal system, including the police, is anti-Dalit and anti-poor. The death penalty laws' wrathful majesty, in blood-shot equality, deals the fatal blow on the poor not the rich, the pariah not the brahmin, the black not the white, the underdog not the top dog, the dissenter not the conformist. . . The law barks at all but bites only the poor, the powerless, the illiterate, the ignorant.

  V. R. Krishna Iyer

  Dog, Blow, Blood

  53 Copy quote

• I'm opposed to the death penalty not because I think it's unconstitutional per se-although I think it's been applied in ways that are unconstitutional-but it really is a moral view, and that is that the taking of life is not the way to handle even the most significant of crimes...Who amongst anyone is not above redemption? I think we have to be careful in executing final judgment. The one thing my faith teaches me-I don't get to play God. I think you are short-cutting the whole process of redemption...I don't want to be the person that stops that process from taking place.

  Jay Sekulow

  Cutting, Thinking, Views

  4 Copy quote

• I don't think there's any question that someday somebody who is innocent will be executed in this country again.

  Bill McCollum

  Country, Thinking, Someday

  4 Copy quote

• Commute me, execute me. Don't drag it out.

  Jesse Bishop

  Drag

  5 Copy quote

• 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

  Race, Decision, Political

  45 Copy quote

• If you are neutral in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor.

  Desmond Tutu

  Bullying, Justice, Sides

  "The secrets of a peacemaker". Interview with Gary Younge, www.theguardian.com. May 22, 2009.

  69 Copy quote

  Show source

• The attorney general doesn't favor one method or the other, he favors the death penalty.

  Bob Butterworth

  Favors, Penalties, Method

  4 Copy quote

• Many that live deserve death. And some that die deserve life.

  J. R. R. Tolkien

  Fellowship, Lord Of The Ring, Frodo

  J.R.R. Tolkien (2012). “The Lord of the Rings: One Volume”, p.53, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt

  53 Copy quote

  Show source

• Violence just hurts those who are already hurt...Instead of exposing the brutality of the oppressor, it justifies it.

  Cesar Chavez

  Peace, Hurt, Brutality

  9 Copy quote