At the beginning of chapter 7, Lewis Vaughn challenges us with the question "Is it lawful for a society to put to death one of its members for having committed a serious crime? (Page 348). When people commit crimes, no matter how serious, they should still have rights. That being said, opposing the death penalty does not call into question that the victims did break the law. Stephen Nathanson supports this position: "those who commit terrible crimes always deserve some level of decent treatment simply because they remain living, functioning human beings." He suggests that “by renouncing the use of death as punishment, we express and reaffirm our belief in the inalienable and unalterable core of human dignity” (page 354). From a religious point of view, God is the only one who can judge whether a person should live or not, if He can forgive us all our sins, then we should too. Mark 3:28 “Truly I tell you, all their sins and all the slander that they utter can be forgiven men.” Those who respond to God's call will know that through Him they will receive the gift of repentance and cleansing from all sins committed. There shouldn't be a side, but in the world we live in today and in dealing with the death penalty in the chapter, we see those who are for and those who are against. What makes us better than them is that we all do things that in someone else's eyes are wrong, the only real difference is that we don't get caught. It seems that rather than putting the person in prison and giving them the chance to do better in the world we live in today, the person feels better dead. Utilitarianism believes that “it is better that one man die than that the whole people perish” (Kant, 355). We learn that Immanuel Kant is a retributivist and believes in death... middle of paper ... how they can do better for themselves, their families, and society. Mahatma Gandhi wrote a quote that applies perfectly to the argument against the death penalty: “Freedom is not worth having if it does not include the freedom to make mistakes.” » Works Cited Vaughn, Lewis. “Contemporary Moral Arguments” Readings on Ethical Issues. Second edition. Oxford University Press Stevenson, Bryan. Near Death: Reflections on Race and Capital Punishment in America,” in Debating the Death Penalty, ed. Hugo Bedau and Paul Cassell (New York: Oxford University Press, 2004), 97. Nathanson, Stephen. An eye for an eye? (Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2001). Gandhi, Mahatma Quotes on Freedom http://www.goodreads.com/quotes/tag/freedomThe Innocence Project - Innocence and the Death Penalty http://www.innocenceproject.org /Content/The_Innocent_and_the_Death_Penalty.php