The state legislature is considering a bill that would outlaw capital punishment. However, certain lawmakers are doing everything they can to make sure we keep using the death penalty. To those people I say, go to death row and visit the prisoners there. You'll see that even convicted killers are human beings worthy of our mercy.
Which one of the following best describes the author's method of argument?
A. She makes an appeal to her opponents' emotions.
(A) is correct. The argument is clearly an appeal to the reader's sympathy. It promotes the idea that if the reader, one of the lawmakers who favors the death penalty, actually meets a death-row prisoner, he will have sympathy for the prisoner and reflexively oppose executing him, based only on that emotion. The author does not attempt to make any logical arguments against the death penalty.
B. She argues from a general principle to a specific conclusion.
(B) is incorrect because, if anything, she does the opposite. "The state legislature is considering a bill that would outlaw capital punishment" is a statement of a specific fact, not a general principle. The second sentence is also a statement of a specific fact. The author's final statement, "even convicted killers are human beings worthy of our mercy," is a general principle. She arrives at this principle by starting with specific facts, which lead to a suggestion, which she believes would lead her opponents to agree with this principle. She does not start with a general principle, and her "conclusion," such as it is, is not specific.
C. She uses sarcasm to mock her opponents' position.
(C) is incorrect because nothing in the language of the argument suggests a sarcastic tone. There is no irony in the author's words, nor is she making fun of her opponents. She is merely suggesting they do something that might change their minds before they make a decision.
D. She attacks the way in which her opponents have presented their view.
(D) is incorrect because the stimulus does not indicate one way or another how the opponents have presented their view. Note that there is a difference between her opponents' view and how her opponents have presented their view. She may be attacking their view, but she is not attacking the way in which they have presented it.
E. She overlooks a distinction that is essential to her opponents' argument.
(E) is incorrect because neither her argument nor her opponents' appears to hinge on any "distinction."
