Click on this site to find a story about death row inmates who have begun to sell their own art over the Internet. Write an essay in which you discuss the pros and cons of such a practice as they are presented in the article. Be sure to include a position statement of your own on this topic. Do you believe that, as one of the people quoted in the article said, "people on death row have no rights?"
In November, 1998 a conference was held at Northwestern University to examine prosecution, conviction, imprisonment and execution of innocent men and women. Attending the conference were 28 wrongfully convicted and recently freed death row inmates. Click on the link above to get the details of the gathering, and then write an essay in which you address the significance of such a gathering for the American criminal justice system, and in particular, its allowance of capital punishment. Be sure to include a position statement of your own on this topic. Do you think that the risk of executing innocent people is too high to continue using capital punishment?
Click on the link above to read a congressional report on the role that racism appears to play in determining which criminals receive the death penalty and which do not. Pay special attention to the subsection entitled "Background on Race and the Death Penalty." Write an essay in which you explain the specific findings of the report. What do you think we should do about capital punishment if the findings of the report are correct? Remember Hinman's discussion of the "traffic ticket analogy" (pp. 328-329)? If we rely on that analogy, what would we do about the use of capital punishment in the face of these worries about racism?
