Argument #1: Racism
    Fallacy - "The death penalty is racist....[T]he federal death penalty is used disproportionately against minorities, especially African Americans....According to [Justice Department] figures, nearly 80 percent of inmates on federal death row are Black, Hispanic, or from another minority group."  (Campaign to End the Death Penalty)
    Correction - According to the Bureau of Justice Statistics, blacks committed 51.5% of murders between 1976 and 1999, while whites committed 46.5%.  Though blacks have committed most of these murders since the death penalty was reinstated whites have made up the majority of inmates under the sentence of death.  In the year 2000 the ratio of people on death row was 1,990 whites to 1,535 blacks and 68 others.  49 of 85 people actually put to death were whites.

Argument #2: Cost
    Fallacy - "It costs more to execute a person than to keep him or her in prison for life.  A 1993 California study argues that each death penalty case costs at least $1.25 million more than a regular murder case and a sentence of life without the possibility of parole." (deathpenalty.org)
    Correction - It cost 3 times as much to put a person to death than to have life in prison for 40 years.  However, prisoners put in for life that exceed the 40 years (most young adults) end up costing more with a long life in prison than if they had been executed.

Argument #3: Cruel and Unusual
    Fallacy - "The death penalty: Always cruel, always inhuman, always degrading ... there can be no masking the inherent cruelty of the death penalty." (Amnesty International)
    Correction - All of the nations of the world have had the death penalty on lawbooks throughout most of recorded history, the death penalty also remains on the statute books of close to half of the nations of the world.  All U.S. states had the death penalty on their statute books when the Constitution was adopted.  Also, when the Founding Fathers who adopted the Bill of Rights which bans "cruel and unusual punishement" had no problem with implementing the death penalty and hangings.

Argument #4: The Company We Keep
    Fallacy - "The USA is keeping company with notorious human rights abusers.  The vast majority of countries in Western Europe, North America and South America -- more tan 105 nations worldwide -- havve abandoned capital punishment.  The United States remains in the same company as Iraq, Iran, and China as one of the major advocates and users of capital punishment." (deathpenalty.org)

Argument #5: No Deterrence
    Fallacy - "Capital Punishment does not deter crime.  Scientific studies have consistently failed to demonstrate that executions deter people from committing crime." (Death Penalty Focus)
    Correction - The death penalty does deter in some cases.  Those executed will no longer be around to commit any more crimes.

Argument #6: No Mercy
    Fallacy - "It is a hell of a thing, killing a man.  You take away all he's got, and all he's ever gonna have." (Clint Eastwood's character in the movie Unforgiven)
    Correction - Thomas Aquinas said in his Summa Theologica that, "if a man be dangerous and infectious to the community, on account of some sin, it is praiseworthy and advantageous that he be killed in order to safeguard the common good."  Aquinas also explained that, "punishment may be considered as a medicine, not only healing the past sin, but also preserving from future sin."  Even though a life is being taken from a murderer, he will be better off because "spiritual goods are of the greatest consequence, while temporal goods are least important."