单项选择题
| Sometimes opponents of capital
punishment horrify with tales of lingering death on the gallows, of faulty
electric chairs, or of agony in the gas chamber. Partly in response to such
protests, several states such as North Carolina and Texas switched to execution
by lethal injection. The condemned person is put to death painlessly, without
ropes, voltage, bullets, or gas. Did this answer the objections of death penalty
opponents Of course not. On June 22, 1984, The New York Times published an
editorial that sarcastically attacked the new "hygienic" method of death by
injection, and stated that "execution can never be made humane through science."
So it’s not the method that really troubles opponents. It’s the death itself
they consider barbaric. Admittedly, capital punishment is not a pleasant topic. However, one does not have to like the death penalty in order to support it any more than one must like radical surgery, radiation, or chemotherapy in order to find necessary these attempts at curing cancer. Ultimately we may learn how to cure cancer with a simple pill. Unfortunately, that day has not yet arrived. Today we are faced with the choice of letting the cancer spread or trying to cure it with the methods available, methods that one day will almost certainly be considered barbaric. But to give up and do nothing would be far more barbaric and would certainly delay the discovery of an eventual cure. We may not like the death penalty, but it must be available to punish crimes of cold-blooded murder, eases in which any other form of punishment would be inadequate and, therefore, unjust. If we create a society in which injustice is not tolerated, incidents of murder--the most flagrant form of injustice--will diminish. |