A right isn't just something you want or think you should have, it's something you’re legally entitled to - something that the law says no one should be able to stop you from having.
So what rights do we have?
The Universal Declaration of Human Rights
After the horrors of World War II, many countries wanted to do something to make sure that it could never happen again whereby a government could decide that some people mattered and some people didn’t. So together they drew up the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, a document that sets out some key things that all human beings should be allowed. Things like the freedom to believe in whatever religion you want (or none at all), the right to get married and have children, the right not to be tortured and the right not to be held as a slave. All pretty good stuff really.
Not every country in the world has signed up to the declaration, but lots have. The UK even passed a Human Rights Act in 1998 which made 16 of those rights part of our national law, so it would be illegal for anyone to take those rights away from us no matter how old we are, what colour our skin is, or what gender or sexuality we have. And Section 2 of that Human Rights Act says "Every human being has the inherent right to life”. That means a natural, built-in right to be alive and to stay that way.
So how can the death penalty be legal?
If you keep reading Section 2, however, you’ll spot some interesting things. Take a look:
"Every human being has the inherent right to life. This right shall be protected by law. No one shall be arbitrarily deprived of his life. Everyone has the right to life, liberty and security of the person and the right not to be deprived thereof except in accordance with the principles of fundamental justice."
Aha - so we have the right to life, but with a few limitations…
"No one shall be arbitrarily deprived of his life"
If something is arbitrary, it means that it's based on random choice or personal whim, rather than any reason or system. So it’s illegal for someone to kill you just because you’ve irritated them, or because it’s Tuesday, or because they don’t like the shoes you’re wearing. But what this leaves room for is the idea that if the reasons are not arbitrary - if they’re clear, fair and rational - then our right to life isn't guaranteed anymore. And when you add that together with the next sentence...
"...the right not to be deprived [of life] except in accordance with the principles of fundamental justice"
This is saying a similar thing - it’s showing that our right to life is limited, we don’t have it in every circumstance. The justice systems of some countries say that when you commit a terrible crime you should lose your life to pay for what you’ve done. And the law of Human Rights says that if it’s a principle of fundamental justice, then you’ve reached the limits of your right to life - and the law stops protecting you.
This is true with other areas of the law and Human Rights. We all have a right to freedom - but if someone’s imprisoned, their right to freedom has been taken away. They lose that right when they break the law. In a similar way, in countries that have the death penalty, the law gives everyone the right to life - but if an individual commits a certain crime deemed as punishable by the death, then they lose its protection.
Has the Human Rights Act got it right?
But the big question is - do you agree with the wording of the Universal Human Rights Declaration? Do you think there should be limits on our right to life? Are there things we can do that mean we lose our rights? Or is there a natural moral value to human life that shouldn’t have any limits - no matter the situation? That’s for you to figure out.
Around the world in executions
Which country sentences the most people to death?
No one knows exactly how many people China executes, but Amnesty International estimates that thousands are put to death in secret every year.
Which country is said to have used government-sponsored death squads to carry out mass executions in 2016?
Philippine president Rodrigo Duterte is committed to fighting a war on drugs and in 2016 it cost an estimated 6,000 drug dealers and users their lives. Duterte has vowed to do whatever it takes to continue this drug war until ‘the last drug lord is killed’.
How many people have the US executed since 1976?
And more than 37% of them have happened in Texas. They’ve executed more than 540 inmates since 1976 and have a few hundred more on death row waiting to be killed.
Which is the only country in Europe to retain the death penalty?
Belarus reserves the legal right to execute individuals by firing squad for especially grave crimes. More than 400 people have been executed since 1991.
James Pratt and John Smith were the last people to be hanged in 1835 in the UK for which crime?
At this point in history, same-sex relationships were illegal. So when a landlord spotted these two men visiting the room of a third man late at night, it was reported and they were all put on trial for sodomy (men having sex with other men.)
How many countries still have the death penalty?
They’re spread out across the continents and Egypt, Zimbabwe, Barbados, Cuba, Jamaica, India, Japan and Thailand are just a few of the 58.
In the 1600s it was illegal to be a witch in the US. How many so-called witches were executed in the Salem Witch Trials between 1692 and 1693?
200 people were convicted of witchcraft, but only 19 were actually executed before it was decided that the trials had been a mistake.
When was the guillotine last used in the Western world?
Although we think of it as quite a medieval form of execution, it was only about 40 years ago that it was used to execute Hamida Djandoubi for the crimes of torture and murder in Marseille, France.
Why you might think it’s a good idea
It makes it impossible for criminals to do bad things over and over again
Executing someone permanently stops the worst criminals and means we can all feel safer, as they can’t commit any more crimes. If they were in prison they might escape, or be let out for good behaviour. Executing them means they’re definitely gone for good.
It’s cheaper than prison
It costs the government quite a lot of money to keep someone in prison for the whole of their life, so executing them can save money. It’s slightly different in every country (in America the death penalty is pretty expensive) but on the whole, it’s a cheaper option.
It’s proportional to the crime
If someone has killed another person, you might think it’s fair that they suffer the same punishment - death. After all, we shouldn’t forget the old fashioned (but still relevant) principle lex talionis, a Latin phrase which loosely translated means ‘an eye for an eye’.
It scares other people who might be thinking about committing a crime
If you knew you would be put to death if you killed someone, you’d probably be less inclined to do it. It’s the ultimate warning and hopes to put other offenders off (we call this a deterrence).
It helps the victim’s family get closure
If someone in your family had been murdered, you might well feel that it’s only right that they die too (this is known as retribution). It might help you grieve and move on from their death if you felt the person who had killed them was gone too.
Why you might think it’s a bad idea
Sometimes people are innocent
Sometimes the courts and the judges get it wrong and condemn an innocent person to death. A recent US study showed that at least 4.1% of all people sentenced to death in the US in the modern era are innocent - that’s one person in every 25 people!
It’s cruel
Every form of execution causes the prisoner suffering - whether it’s the electric chair, or hanging, or chopping their heads off. And it causes huge mental and emotional suffering too - imagine knowing that you were going to die tomorrow morning at 8 am? Pretty horrible. And no matter what someone has done they shouldn’t be forced to suffer something so inhumane.
It’s not fair to the criminal’s family
Imagine how you’d feel if someone in your family committed murder and was sentenced to death. You’d be incredibly sad and upset and why should you be punished? You didn’t do anything wrong. At least if they were just in prison you could still visit them. But that’s a little harder if they’re dead.
It doesn’t give people a chance to change
We all make mistakes in life - sometimes little ones like forgetting homework, sometimes huge ones like murdering someone. If we put murderers to death, they never get the chance to learn from their mistakes or make a positive contribution to the world. Imagine if we put to death someone that might have worked out the cure for cancer?
It’s hypocritical
If it’s illegal to murder, why is it OK for the state to do it? Doesn’t that send the wrong message? Killing someone is either wrong or right, and our society has said it’s wrong and made it against the law - so why does the government get to break that law?
Women and the death penalty: 4 things you didn’t know
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Of the 58 countries in the world that have the death penalty, only 37 currently have any women on their ‘death row’ awaiting execution - but all of them have men. One important factor to consider is that much fewer women commit violent crimes. A global study from 2013 by the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime found that men committed about 96 percent of all homicides worldwide. That said, it’s possible that some countries are willing to give lighter sentences to women for some types of crimes, although this is not the norm: usually, the same crime is punished in the same way, regardless of the criminal’s gender. Some exceptions to this are Belarus, Guatemala, Russia and Tajikistan, all of which have actually made it illegal to sentence a woman to death. Although even when women are given the death penalty, it seems they’re more likely to be let off. Statistics from the UK show that in the 20th century 145 women were sentenced to death, but only 14 of those sentences were actually carried out - that means just over 90% of women were excused instead of executed. The rate of pardons for men is much lower. Of course, there might be other reasons for why judges have been more lenient with women in the past – reasons that have nothing to do with the severity of the crime. For example, countries may be more lenient with female criminals when they have young children.
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Not in every country, but in a fair few. For example Iran - their laws allow the death penalty for boys from age 15 and for girls from age 9. More generally, there are a few countries that uphold some or all parts of Sharia Law (the religious law forming part of the Islamic tradition) e.g. Sudan, Afghanistan, Qatar, Egypt, and Libya. Under a strict interpretation of Sharia Law, a boy can’t be sentenced to death until he’s 14 years and 5 months old (it’s very specific), but a girl can be executed as soon as she turns 8 years and 8 months old. But remember, different countries use these laws differently: even if something is allowed by law, that doesn’t mean it’s always actually practised in all of these countries. Also, different countries sign different international conventions and treaties, some of which may be in tension with a strict use of Sharia Law.
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With the exception of one country (the two-island Caribbean nation Saint Kitts and Nevis) it’s actually illegal to execute a pregnant woman, as that would involve killing an innocent human being - the baby. Some countries just delay the execution until after the woman’s given birth, but most of them end up excusing the sentence altogether and just imprisoning them. So you can see why, in some cases, women have actually tried to get pregnant by bribing guards to sleep with them so that they could avoid the death penalty.
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The law in Iran says that if a woman gets caught having sex or gets pregnant outside marriage, she can be sentenced to death. And in countries governed by Sharia law, like Saudi Arabia, Pakistan and Somalia, having sex outside of marriage is officially illegal for everyone - both men and women - but in reality, men are rarely punished as severely as women. Like the case in Saudi Arabia in 2015, where a woman caught sleeping with a man she wasn’t married to was sentenced to death, while the man she was caught with was only given a beating.
Is the death penalty OK?
If someone has killed another person, you might think it’s fair that they suffer the same punishment. After all, we shouldn’t forget the old-fashioned principle lex talionis, a Latin phrase which loosely translated means ‘an eye for an eye’. It might also help the victim’s family get closure. If someone in your family had been murdered, you might feel that it’s only right that they die too (this is known as retribution). It might help you grieve and move on from their death if you knew the person who had killed them was gone too.
Sometimes the courts and judges get it wrong and condemn an innocent person to death. A recent US study showed that at least 4.1% of all people sentenced to death in the US in the modern era are innocent - that’s one person in every 25 people. It also doesn’t give people a chance to change. If we put murderers to death, they never get the chance to learn from their mistakes or make a positive contribution to the world. Imagine if we put to death someone who might have worked out the cure for cancer?
The death penalty makes it impossible for criminals to do bad things over and over again. Executing someone permanently stops the worst criminals and means we can all feel safer, as they can’t commit any more crimes. It also scares other people who might be thinking about committing a crime and so it serves as a 'deterrence'. If you knew you would be put to death if you killed someone, you’d probably be less inclined to do it. It’s the ultimate warning and hopes to put other offenders off
The Universal Declaration of Human Rights is a document that sets out key things that all human beings should be allowed. Things like freedom of belief, the right to get married, and the right not to be held as a slave. In 1998, The UK passed a Human Rights Act which made 16 of these rights part of UK law, so it would be illegal for anyone to take those rights away. Also, Section 2 of that Human Rights Act says "Every human being has the inherent right to life”. That means a natural, built-in right to be alive and to stay that way.
In some areas of the law and of Human Rights there are exceptions. We all have a right to freedom - but if someone’s imprisoned, their right to freedom has been taken away. They lose that right when they break the law. In a similar way, in countries that have capital punishment, the law gives everyone the right to life - but if an individual commits a certain crime deemed as punishable by the death penalty, then they lose its protection.
In the US, the death penalty is very expensive. It's not just the cost of prosecuting and putting a person on death row, there's also the cost of keeping them there. When criminals are on death row they can appeal their sentence (argue that they are innocent), a process that may last more than a decade. Some studies suggest that the cost of a death sentence in the US is about $3 million, but keeping somebody in prison for life costs about $1.1 million. This makes the death penalty three times as expensive.