Death Penalty and Electric Chair Essay examples -- essays research pap

When Moran writes that he aims to demonstrate how our most cherished social determine can be manipulated to serve pecuniary interests the way in which national policy is affected by behind-the-scenes maneuvering of powerful and often remorseless transmission line interests, I think he is talking solely nearly the ending penalty (xviii). There are various aspects within the death penalty that make it a much more dynamic issue. throughout his book, Moran writes about the inhumanity of the death penalty, including the barbaric methods and man spectacle of the act previous to William Kemmler, and most importantly, the safety and efficacy of direct accredited versus alternating current in the eventually preferred method of the electric chair. Thomas Edison and George Westinghouse, on with a few others, were the players who manipulated how the public, and therefore the lawmakers, felt about this social policy. As it is today, the death penalty was a big debate issue in the early part of the nineteenth century. I think it is interesting that, considering his study public role in this issue, Thomas Edison was initially against capital punishment. When Dr. Southwick solicited Mr. Edisons advice on the electric chair, Edison wrote as a progressive and a stop thinker, he was a lifelong opponent of the death penalty (74). With merely prodding, and deeper review, Edison realized how getting involved with this issue would help his personal business cause. Thomas Edisons light business was quickly losing ground to relate George Westinghouse. He knew he was widely respected as an electrical devise and claimed not to change his stance on executions, but acknowledged the demand and offered a humane alternative with electricity. More specifically and strategically, he offered up George Westinghouses alternating current dynamos as a possibility because he claimed, the passage of the current from these machinesproduces instantaneous death (75). These statements made their way to the Elbridge Gerry, an Edison wiz and man appointed to head a review commission on the death penalty. Not surprisingly the focus of the policy soon changed to the barbarism and inhumanity of executions, especially hangings, and ways to make the process more civilized. Elbridge Gerrys commission report, influenc... ...dison hoping to get Edison to say something about Westinghouse. Moran writes, but Edison was too subtile a businessman, and too conscious of his nature, to say anything negative about his competition (179). Ultimately Kemmler was resentenced to die by electrocution.In conclusion, Thomas Edison knew his power and prestige and he saw the potential to remove his biggest competitor by manipulating how the public felt about the safety of alternating current. George Westinghouse hoped that he could save his reputation and business by appealing to the unknown regarding electricity. He manipulated the publics fill over the possible painful and ineffective e lectric chair. both were driven not by progress and humanity, as Edison claimed, or concern for the criminal, as Westinghouse claimed, but by power and money in the persistence that both men were pioneering. BibliographyRichard, Moran Executioners Current Thomas Edison, George Westinghouse, and the purpose of the Electric Chair. (New York Vintage Press, 2002), pp 74, 75, 84, 105, 160, 179.