Well, no, maybe it was a straw person argument.
Maybe it is better that ten confirmed rapists and murderers be set loose on the streets to murder and rape again rather than lock up one innocent guy along with the ten menaces to society.As has been pointed out, the death penalty is not applied in the US for anything other than murder. But then the statement he quotes doesn't have anything to do with the death penalty. What's up with that, eh?
He's using an argument made about something else altogether in some apparent effort to knock down your argument about the death penalty? Why would he expect you to defend an opinion about Thing X in the middle of a discussion about Thing Y??
Are you falling into his trap, or was your discussion originally this scattered? --
Anyway, my point is simply that if we claim to live in a just society, that to accept the death or imprisonment of a single person moves that society one step close to totalitarianism."Death" and "imprisonment" are really apples and oranges in this situation.
The death penalty debate can be had without bringing the possibility of wrongful conviction into it. Opposition to the death penalty can be argued even if the assumption is made that no one is ever wrongfully convicted of a capital offence.
The right to life cannot be violated without due process. In Canada, we make this wider: we refer to "the principles of fundamental justice", which means more than due process. In the US, you do have the doctrine of substantive due process. I'm not the best person to explain it to you, being a Canadian rather than USAmerican constitutional scholar, but essentially it means that the law itself, and not just the manner in which it is applied, must be "just".
When a govt wants to violate somebody's rights, it must have justification, however that concept is framed in anybody's local constitutional doctrine. It must have a valid purpose in mind, an objective that it is properly pursuing. What it proposes to do must have some rational connection with achieving that purpose. The violation of rights that it is proposing must be proportionate to the purpose it seeks to achieve. It must be able to demonstrate that there is no other reasonable way to achieve that purpose. I'm using the language of the Canadian doctrine, but the US doctrine isn't a tremendous amount different.
There just isn't any good argument for the death penalty, from any of those perspectives. What protection does it offer society that life imprisonment does not offer? What greater deterrent effect does it have on people considering committing murder than life imprisonment has? (In point of fact, people who commit murder are just not likely to be deterred by any potential sentence, because murder, and murderers, are almost always impulsive.)
The onus is always on the party proposing to violate rights to demonstrate justification, although the standard it must meet will vary. Obviously, the standard to be met by someone proposing to kill someone else is the highest imaginable.
A proposal to fine speeders wouldn't have to rest on absolute proof that people are deterred from speeding by the possibility of fines, or that there is no other less intrusive way to reduce highway carnage, and so on -- because a fine just isn't that big a deal; it isn't that serious an interference with a right. Being killed is.
Make him do the work. He's the one who has the burden of persuasion, not you. Your constitution already says that everyone has a right to life and not to be deprived of life without due process (and equal protection). You don't have to persuade him of the idea that everyone has a right to life that cannot be violated without justification -- all you have to do is cite that fifth amendment:
http://lab.pava.purdue.edu/pol101/Reference/Constitution/constitution.table.htmlAmendment V
No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a grand jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the militia, when in actual service in time of war or public danger; nor shall any person be subject for the same offense to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.
Of course, there's also the fact that the entire rest of the civilized world regards the death penalty as "cruel and unusual punishment" --
Amendment VIII
Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted.
-- but hey, that's just a matter of opinion. Of course, everything's a matter of opinion, but the fact that the entire civilized world shares a particular opinion is persuasive for some people. I won't suggest that you rest your case on that point. ;)
But then that's the real problem: you're not starting out from any common set of values, so you're unlikely to agree on a policy, because you're each wanting the policy for different reasons. Unless you go back farther, to some set of values that you can establish that you *do* share, you can't discuss how best to achieve their objectives.
That's why we do have constitutions, of course -- to establish those common values, which govern such discussions regardless of whether any party likes them. Nobody has to go behind them. There is, in the US, a right to life and not to be deprived thereof without due process. And in the rest of the world, which has formally adopted that same expression of that value, that everyone has a right to life, there is considered to be no due process big enough to justify violating the right. Let him give it a shot!
Oh, and just in case he tries it:
nobody "forfeits" the right to life, not ever, not by doing anything, no matter how much what somebody does might annoy him. That is what "inalienable" means.
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