Death Penalty Quotes - Page 5

• No true believer could be intolerant or a persecutor. If I were a magistrate and the law carried the death penalty against atheists, I would begin by sending to the stake whoever denounced another.

  Jean-Jacques Rousseau

  Atheist, Law, Atheism

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• If you think aficionados of a living Constitution want to bring you flexibility, think again. You think the death penalty is a good idea? Persuade your fellow citizens to adopt it. You want a right to abortion? Persuade your fellow citizens and enact it. That's flexibility.

  Antonin Scalia

  Thinking, Ideas, Abortion

  "Scalia Slams 'Living Constitution' Theory". www.foxnews.com. March 14, 2005.

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• If we execute murderers and there is in fact no deterrent effect, we have killed a bunch of murderers. If we fail to execute murderers, and doing so would in fact have deterred other murders, we have allowed the killing of a bunch of innocent victims. I would much rather risk the former. This, to me, is not a tough call.

  John C. McAdams

  Risk, Facts, Tough

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• I know something about killing. I don't like killing. And I don't think a state honors life by turning around and sanctioning killing.

  John F. Kerry

  Thinking, Honor, Belief

  "Live From". www.cnn.com. September 29, 2004.

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• To top it off, for those of you who are interested in the economics, it costs more to pursue a capital case toward execution than it does to have full life imprisonment without parole.

  Ralph Nader

  Doe, Cost, Execution

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• The death penalty is being applied in the United States as a fatal lottery.

  Bianca Jagger

  United States, Penalties, Lottery

  "Texas parole board considers fate of condemned man". www.cnn.com. June 22, 2000.

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• Not all moral issues have the same moral weight as abortion and euthanasia. There may be legitimate diversity of opinion even among Catholics about waging war and applying the death penalty, but not... with regard to abortion and euthanasia.

  Pope Benedict XVI

  War, Issues, Diversity

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• To assert in any case that a man must be absolutely cut off from society because he is absolutely evil amounts to saying that society is absolutely good, and no-one in his right mind will believe this today.

  Albert Camus

  Believe, Cutting, Men

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• My father was against the death penalty, and that was hard in the Son of Sam summer when fear was driving the desire for the death penalty.

  Andrew Cuomo

  Summer, Father, Son

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• With every cell of my being and with every fiber of my memory I oppose the death penalty in all forms. I do not believe any civilized society should be at the service of death. I don't think it's human to become an agent of the angel of death.

  Elie Wiesel

  Memories, Believe, Angel

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• I have come to think that capital punishment should be abolished.

  Jack Kemp

  Thinking, Punishment, Should

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• I was a supporter and believer in the death penalty, but I've begun to see that this system doesn't work and it isn't functional. It costs an obscene amount of money.

  Gil Garcetti

  Cost, Law Enforcement, Penalties

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• It's just really tragic after all the horrors of the last 1,000 years we can't leave behind something as primitive as government-sponsored execution.

  Russ Feingold

  Government, Years, Lasts

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• Capital punishment, like the rest of the criminal justice system, is a government program, so skepticism is in order.

  George Will

  Government, Order, Punishment

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• My overriding belief is that it is always possible for criminals to improve and that by its very finality the death penalty contradicts this.

  Dalai Lama

  Criminals, Belief, Penalties

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• The death penalty would be even more effective, as a deterrent, if we executed a few innocent people more often.

  Edward Abbey

  People, Would Be, Innocent

  Edward Abbey (2015). “A Voice Crying in the Wilderness”, p.20, RosettaBooks

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• Capital punishment is against the best judgment of modern criminology and, above all, against the highest expression of love in the nature of God.

  Martin Luther King, Jr.

  Expression, Punishment, Judgment

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• The victims of crime have been transformed into a group oppressively burdened by a system designed to protect them.

  Ronald Reagan

  Groups, Crime, Victim

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• Only in America can you be Pro-Death Penalty, Pro-War, Pro-Unmanned Drone Bombs, Pro-Nuclear Weapons, Pro-Guns, Pro-Torture, Pro-Land Mines, AND still call yourself 'Pro-Life.'

  John Fugelsang

  Military, War, Gun

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• I was personally opposed to the death penalty, and yet I think I have probably asked for the death penalty more than most people in the United States.

  Janet Reno

  Thinking, People, United States

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• I had concluded when I was the prosecutor that I would vote against the death penalty if I were in the legislature but that I could ask for it when I was satisfied as to guilt.

  Janet Reno

  Guilt, Vote, Legislature

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• To exclude all jurors who would be in the slightest way effected by the prospect of the death penalty would be to deprive the defendant of the impartial jury to which he or she is entitled under the law.

  Byron White

  Law, Way, Would Be

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• The death penalty is no more effective a deterrent than life imprisonment... It is also evident that the burden of capital punishment falls upon the poor, the ignorant and the underprivileged members of society.

  Thurgood Marshall

  Fall, Punishment, Ignorant

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• There is a legitimate argument over whether the death penalty effectively deters violent crime, although my personal observation is that not one of the criminals who have been executed over the years has ever killed again.

  Dinesh D'Souza

  Years, Criminals, Lawyer

  Dinesh D'Souza (2009). “Letters to a Young Conservative”, p.127, Basic Books

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• I support the death penalty because I believe, if administered swiftly and justly, capital punishment is a deterrent against future violence and will save other innocent lives.

  George W. Bush

  Believe, Punishment, Support

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