With the possible exception of equal rights, perhaps the most 【A1】________ issue across the United States today is the death penalty. Many argue that it is an effective deterrent to murder,  【A2】________ others maintain there is no convincing evidence that the death penalty reduces the number of murders. The principal argument  【A3】________ by those opposed to the death penalty, basically, is that it is cruel and inhuman punishment, that it is the mark of a brutal society, and finally that it is of  【A4】________ effectiveness as a deterrent to crime anyway. In our opinion, the death penalty is a  【A5】________evil. Throughout recorded history there have always been those extreme individuals in every society who were  【A6】________of terribly violent crimes such as murder. But some are more extreme than others. For example, it is one thing to  【A7】________the life of another in a fit of blind rage, but quite another to coldly plot and 【A8】________themurder of one or more people in the style of a butcher. Thus, murder 【A9】________ all other crimes, is a matter of relative degree. While it could be argued with some conviction, that the criminal in the first instance should be merely isolated from society, such should not be the fate of the  【A10】________ type murder. The value of the death penalty as a deterrent to crime may be open to debate. But the  【A11】________ majority of citizens believe that the death penalty protects them. Their belief is  【A12】________by evidence which shows that the death penalty deters murder.  【A13】________, from 1954 to 1963, when the death penalty was consistently imposed in California, the murder rate remained between three and four murders for each 100, 000 population. Since 1964 the death penalty has been 【A14】________ only once, and the murder rate has risen to 10. 4 murders for each 100, 000 population. The sharp climb in the state’ s murder rate, which began when executions stopped, is no  【A15】________.