Reserved today for the most serious crimes [particularly murder and treason], the death penalty [or its analogous capital punishment], is the court-ordered execution of a prisoner as punishment for a “capital” crime (definitions vary from state to state). The brutal killing of a citizen by the state dates back to antiquity. Indeed, from an objective point of view, the Gospel account of the trial and subsequent crucifixion of Christ over two thousand (2000) years ago can be considered a classic death penalty trial. As a result, he was brought to the authorities; subsequently arrested; given a process; He remained silent at the accusations; He was subsequently tried; condemned; sentenced to death; and ultimately saw his request for mercy rejected by two rulers even though there was no conclusive evidence to so condemn him, outside of the mob calling for his head. Today, the death penalty continues and remains a controversial, polarizing, and emotionally charged topic, filled with passionate conviction from both maintainers and abolitionists: it is infused with morally persuasive arguments on both sides of the fence. Already in 1830 the Marquis de Lafayette declared loudly: "I will ask for the abolition of the death penalty until the infallibility of human judgment is demonstrated to me." Why? The following quote from Stewart J sums it up perfectly as:[T]he death penalty differs from all other forms of criminal punishment, not in degree but in nature. It treats all condemned persons... not as uniquely individual human beings, but as members of a faceless, undifferentiated mass... subjected to the blind infliction of the death penalty. Death, in its finality, differs most from life imprisonment… middle of paper… the community has overwhelmingly accepted the position that the application of the death penalty amounts to cruel and inhuman treatment or punishment. Why? Because not only does the State, with all its moral virtues, have time available to change its mind, but also civil society is capable of preparing, premeditating and effectively participating in the suppression of human life. Thus, depriving the recipient of any dignity and self-respect he deserves simply by being human adds the ultimate effect of “[C]increase[ing] the value of human life.” By therefore sanctioning executions by the State, the State ignores the fundamental concepts of the right to life and dignity of the individual, and consequently the very respect for the human rights of the individual (a concept introduced throughout the world by most of modern democracies).