Death Penalty Quotes - Page 7

• The death penalty, I think, is a terrible scar on American justice, especially the concept of equal justice under law, but also of due process. And it goes state by state, and it's different in different states.

  Burke Marshall

  Thinking, Law, Justice

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• In battle, combatants engaged in war against America get no due process and may lawfully be killed. But citizens not in a battlefield - however despicable - are guaranteed a trial by our Constitution. No one argues that Americans who commit treason shouldn't be punished. The maximum penalty for treason is death. But the Constitution specifies the process necessary to convict.

  Rand Paul

  Father, War, Technology

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• Our history shows that the death penalty has been unjustly imposed, innocents have been killed by the state, effective rehabilitation has been impaired, judicial administration has suffered. It is the poor, the sick, the ignorant, the powerless, and the hated who are executed.

  Ramsey Clark

  Sick, Ignorant, Rehabilitation

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• [Sen. John] Kerry is also a man who opposes the death penalty, wants to restrict access to guns and voted against the resolution approving the start of ground operations against Saddam Hussein in 1991 - just what you would expect from Ted Kennedy's partner and Michael Dukakis's running mate.

  David S. Broder

  Running, Gun, Men

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• I've seen lots of murders, no murder is ever nice, and I just don't think the victim's family has an opportunity to get all the justice they might want. We seem to always forget about victim's families and we focus in on the criminal and we need to get away from that and focus on the people that are actually suffering because of the incident. They can lobby their elected State's Attorney to have the death penalty on the table.

  John Cabello

  Nice, Opportunity, Thinking

  Source: www.teenink.com

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• I want to accelerate, not slow down, the enforcement of the death penalty in Florida.

  Jeb Bush

  Florida, Enforcement, Want

  "If You Think Jeb Bush Is A Moderate, Then You Missed His 1994 Campaign" by Christina Wilkie, www.huffingtonpost.com. January 08, 2015.

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• I support the death penalty for the kingpin, the guy at the top, but I don't think you should throw a drug offender in jail for five years, and let a mugger out after a year.

  Charles Schumer

  Thinking, Years, Jail

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• When I was running for governor, I was attacked pretty strongly because of my position on the death penalty. But I looked the voters of Virginia in the eye and said, look, this is my religion. I'm not going to change my religious practice to get one vote, but I know how to take an oath and uphold the law. And if you elect me, I will uphold the law.

  Tim Kaine

  Running, Religious, Eye

  "Expanding the Debate: Green Ajamu Baraka “Debates” Pence & Kaine in Democracy Now! Special–Part 1". www.democracynow.org. October 05, 2016.

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• Only the doctor and the judge have the right to inflict the death penalty without receiving the same.

  Philemon

  Death, Science, Doctors

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• For me the hardest struggle in my faith life was the Catholic Church is against the death penalty.

  Tim Kaine

  Struggle, Catholic, Church

  Source: www.politico.com

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• While the Church exhorts civil authorities to seek peace, not war, and to exercise discretion and mercy in imposing punishment on criminals, it may still be permissible to take up arms to repel an aggressor or to have recourse to capital punishment. There may be a legitimate diversity of opinion even among Catholics about waging war and applying the death penalty, but not however with regard to abortion and euthanasia.

  Pope Benedict XVI

  War, Exercise, Punishment

  "War and Capital Punishment" by Jimmy Akin, www.catholic.com. March 2, 2005.

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• Yes, (Bush is a) racist. We all knew that but the world is only finding it out now. As Texas's governor, Bush led a penitentiary system that executed more people than all the other U.S. states together. And most of the people who died from (the) death penalty were Afro-Americans or Hispanics. (Bush) promoted a Conservative program, designed to eliminate everything Americans had accomplished so far in matters of race and equality.

  Danny Glover

  Race, Texas, People

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• My objection to the death penalty is based on the idea that this is a democracy, and in a democracy the government is me, and if the government kills somebody then I'm killing somebody.

  Steve Earle

  Government, Ideas, Democracy

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• 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.

  Gerald Heaney

  Law, Old Testament, Moses

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• Now let me get this straight. Bush is anti-abortion, but pro-death penalty. I guess it's all in the timing, huh?

  Dennis Miller

  Abortion, Timing, Penalties

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• What says the law? You will not kill. How does it say it? By killing!

  Victor Hugo

  Law, Doe, Killing

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• Some wonder why I have such a feeling of concern over the imposition of the death penalty. I ask those who wonder how would you feel if you defended a man charged with murder, who was as innocent as any hon. member in this House at this very moment, who was convicted; whose appeal was dismissed, who was executed; and six months later the star witness for the Crown admitted that he, himself, had committed the murder and blamed it on the accused? That experience will never be effaced from my memory.

  John Diefenbaker

  Stars, Memories, Men

  John Diefenbaker's speech in the House of Commons, May 1, 1972.

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• I don't know if the question is whether you believe in capital punishment anymore. I think the greater question is its effectiveness and given the choices we face in California, should we have a merit-based discussion on its effectiveness and costs?

  Tani Cantil-Sakauye

  Believe, Thinking, Punishment

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• There has never been any evidence that the death penalty reduces capital crimes or that crimes increased when executions stopped. Tragic mistakes are prevalent...It is clear that there are overwhelming ethical, financial, and religious reasons to abolish the death penalty.

  Jimmy Carter

  Religious, Mistake, Execution

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• Conservative talk radio hosts have conned the American people into thinking there is such a thing as a pro-life, pro-war, pro-gun, pro-death penalty Christian.

  Janeane Garofalo

  Christian, War, Gun

  "America Undercover (Left of the Dial)". TV Series, March 31, 2005.

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• The death penalty can be tolerated only by extreme statist reactionaries who demand a state that is so powerful that it has the right to kill.

  Noam Chomsky

  Powerful, Demand, States

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• A man convicted of murder is twenty times more likely than a woman convicted of murder to receive the death penalty. Since the 1976 reinstatement of the death penalty, 120 men and only 1 woman have actually been executed. The woman, from North Carolina, said she preferred to be executed. In North Carolina, a man who commits second-degree murder receives a sentence on average of 12.6 years longer than a woman who commits second-degree murder.

  Warren Farrell

  Men, Average, Years

  "The Myth of Male Power". Book by Warren Farrell, 1993.

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• I haven't committed all the crimes in my movies, I would have gotten the death penalty many years ago if I had.

  John Waters

  Years, Crime, Penalties

  Interview with Jonathan Ross, www.theguardian.com. November 17, 1998.

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• Americans are not going to tolerate intimidation, terror and outright acts of war against this nation and its people. And we are especially not going to tolerate these attacks from outlaw states run by the strangest collection of misfits, Looney Tunes and squalid criminals since the advent of the Third Reich ... There can be no place on earth where it is safe for these monsters to rest,or train or practice their cruel and deadly. We must act together - or unilateraly, if necessary - to ensue that these terrorists have no sanctuary, anywhere.

  Ronald Reagan

  Running, War, Practice

  A speech to the American Bar Association after the TWA Flight 847 hijacking, June 14, 1985.

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• For too long, the victims of crime have been the forgotten persons of our criminal justice system.

  Ronald Reagan

  Justice, Long, Criminals

  Reagan, Ronald (1982). “Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: Ronald Reagan, 1981”, p.340, Best Books on

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