|
Getting your Trinity Audio player ready...
|
The death penalty — subject to racial injustice — is the act of sentencing, someone, to their death as punishment for a crime. The justice system, in general, is known to be racially biased when it comes to Blacks, whites, and everything in between. However, the death penalty specifically has been used to mercifully, yet legally, murder America’s darker-skinned citizens.
On the spectrum of races, it has been proved countless times throughout America’s history that white lives are considered more valuable than Black lives. The way that the death penalty is carried out in a racially biased manner is another example of what the American government keeps demonstrating to its citizens — white skin comes with benefits limited to them only; life-changing and life-saving benefits. Meanwhile, other races have to face the complete opposite, especially African-Americans.
America has made efforts and progress toward eliminating racial injustice, but it is something that the country has still yet to free itself of. There are two ways racial injustice displays itself when it comes to the death penalty. The first-way racial injustice is displayed is when it comes to who gets executed by the death penalty.
For centuries, African-Americans have been convicted and sentenced to the death penalty more than white people. Another way racial injustice is displayed is when it comes to which cases are considered worthy of the death penalty.
Incidents, where white people are the victims, are the most common cases where the offender is sentenced to the death penalty; even though African Americans and Caucasians are about equally likely to be murdered or raped. Early in the twentieth century, it was applied for the crime of rape, 89 percent of the executions involved Black defendants, most for the rape of a white woman.
More recently, executions have been carried out exclusively for murder, 75% of the cases involve the murder of white victims. Although whites and Blacks are about equally likely to be victims of murder. America has let racism corrupt its justice system for long enough. They need to be either racially equal when it comes to the death penalty, or cancel it completely, otherwise, it is just a legal excuse to murder more Black people.
Written by Josie Henderson
Edited by Sheena Robertson
Sources:
Vera: Ending the Death Penalty Is a Step Toward Racial Justice By: Insha Rahman & Logan Schmidt
Death Penalty Information Center: Race
Top and Featured Image Courtesy of Quinn Norton‘s Flickr Page – Creative Commons License
Inset Image Courtesy of Aaron Fulkerson‘s Flickr Page – Creative Commons License