Alright, fair enough.
First of all, I don't believe in moral truths or values. I subscribe to a sort of blend of expressivism and error theory, basically moral nihilism. If you don't already know, this should suffice as an explanation of those terms:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moral_nihilism#Forms
Here are the rationales and the facts behind my opposition of capital punishment:
Many influential philosophers have made arguments against capital punishment. You can read about that and abolition of capital punishment in Europe here:
https://books.google.no/books?id=9CTUR5yOogMC&pg=PA105&lpg=PA105&dq=voltaire+anti+death+penalty&source=bl&ots=dKjt3nOzzj&sig=Zu3PAkDV_5og5nkCC_-iIM-r-KY&hl=en&ei=lItfTpDKF-fjiAKsiZXPDg&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&sqi=2#v=onepage&q&f=false
Capital punishment causes many wrongful executions. You can read about that, and a ton of other topics regarding capital punishment here:
http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org/causes-wrongful-convictions
http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org/innocence-and-death-penalty?did=412&scid=6
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_wrongful_convictions_in_the_United_States
“Statistics likely understate the actual problem of wrongful convictions because once an execution has occurred there is often insufficient motivation and finance to keep a case open, and it becomes unlikely at that point that the miscarriage of justice will ever be exposed. In the case of
Joseph Roger O'Dell III, executed in Virginia in 1997 for a rape and murder, a prosecuting attorney bluntly argued in court in 1998 that if posthumous DNA results exonerated O'Dell, "it would be shouted from the rooftops that ... Virginia executed an innocent man." The state prevailed, and the evidence was destroyed.”
http://www.truthinjustice.org/DNA-DP.htm
This is a treasure trove of information:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/ethics/capitalpunishment/against_1.shtml#section_4
“Statistics show that the death penalty leads to a brutalisation of society and an increase in murder rate. In the USA, more murders take place in states where capital punishment is allowed. In 2010, the murder rate in states where the death penalty has been abolished was 4.01 per cent per 100,000 people. In states where the death penalty is used, the figure was 5.00 per cent. These calculations are based on figures from the FBI. The gap between death penalty states and non-death penalty states rose considerably from 4 per cent difference in 1990 to 25 per cent in 2010.
Source: FBI Uniform Crime Report, from Death Penalty Information Center
Disturbed individuals may be angered and thus more likely to commit murder.
It is also linked to increased number of police officers murdered.”
Capital punishment is costly:
“In the USA capital punishment costs a great deal.
For example, the cost of convicting and
executing Timothy McVeigh for the Oklahoma City Bombing was over $13 million.
In New York and New Jersey, the high costs of capital punishment were one factor in those states' decisions to abandon the death penalty. New York spent about $170 million over 9 years and had no executions. New Jersey spent $253 million over a 25-year period and also had no executions.
Source: Death Penalty Information Center
In countries with a less costly and lengthy appeals procedure, capital punishment seems like a much cheaper option than long-term imprisonment.”
More sources about the costs of capital punishment:
http://www.deathpenalty.org/article.php?id=42
http://www.safecalifornia.org/downloads/2.5.B_executingwillofvoters.pdf
“Turns out, it is cheaper to imprison killers for life than to execute them, according to a series of recent surveys. Tens of millions of dollars cheaper, politicians are learning, during a tumbling recession when nearly every state faces job cuts and massive deficits.
So an increasing number of them are considering abolishing capital punishment in favor of life imprisonment, not on principle but out of financial necessity.
"It's 10 times more expensive to kill them than to keep them alive," though most Americans believe the opposite, said Donald McCartin, a former California jurist known as "The Hanging Judge of Orange County" for sending nine men to death row.”"
http://www.nbcnews.com/id/29552692/ns/us_news-crime_and_courts/t/execute-or-not-question-cost/#.Ty45tlxAu8A
So, based on all of that, capital punishment is more expensive than imprisonment, it doesn't deter violent crime, and it condemns innocent people to death.
