 The Death Penalty is a Crime By Michael WILLARD |
Yeah, I'm one of those mushy liberals who somehow think it is wrong to kill people who might later be proven innocent. A jury of peers in the U.S. has sent - to our knowledge - 23 innocent people to the gallows (or death chamber, or electric chair, or firing squad).
My brother Glen - who is otherwise kind to dogs, children and old folks - would have us believe that's a pretty low percentage when you're talking about 859 executions since the carnage was re-established and the death machine cranked up in 1976.
Maybe, if you're tossing horseshoes blindfolded, but certainly not when a human life is involved.
The U.S. is a nation built on the sanctity of minority rights. And what can be more of a minority right than the innocent few escaping death with the guilty majority. It should be the ultimate right from the ultimate punishment.
Recently, some fellow wrote in these pages of the 10 reasons Ukraine is a better place to live than the United States. He got one right in a sea of wrong answers. Ukraine has abolished the death penalty, he wrote, which is one thing it has in common with my home state of West Virginia.
"Perhaps the bleakest fact of all is that the death penalty is imposed in a freakish and discriminatory manner, but also in some case s upon defendants who are actually innocent," wrote former Supreme Court Justice William J. Brennan Jr. in 1994.
Three decades ago, in a burst of enlightenment, the U.S. Supreme Court struck down all state death penalty statutes as then written, but did not say the death penalty was unconstitutional under the Eighth Amendment, forbidding cruel and unusual punishment.
I remember the day that decision (Furman v Georgia) was released, for I was dispatched by my editor at United Press International to visit the Tennessee State Prison and interview death row inmates. I also got a look at Old Sparky the electric chair close up.
The information from those interviews have long been lost in this dusty attic mind. However, I vividly remember Old Sparky, and the cramped cells on death row that would enclose the inhabitants - murderers and harden criminals - for the rest of their lives.
I personally would never argue against the death penalty on Constitutional grounds of it being cruel and unusual, though it is getting to be unusual in the civilized world. However, I doubt it is more cruel than being forced to live in a tiny cage the remainder of one's days.
My argument is strictly this: I would rather sentence the guilty to a horrible life without parole rather than take one innocent life.
The emotional argument I hear most often is phrased as a question: "You wouldn't believe this way if your wife or daughter were raped and murdered, would you?"
My answer is similar to that of former New York Gov. Mario Cuomo when asked this question on NBC Television's Meet The Press: "If anyone came through that bedroom window and touched Matilda (his wife), I'd probably beat them to death with a baseball bat. Why? Because I am human. And my instinct would be for revenge.
"But we ought to make laws that respect our worst moments. We should be better than that instinct. I have a temper, but our laws should be more intelligent than I am."
If carrying out the death penalty were a contest, the U.S. would rank a heart-stopping No. 4 on the world hit parade among the top nations that execute their criminals. That puts us way behind China, but right up there with Saudi Arabia and Iran.
Other arguments have to do with the death penalty deterring capital crimes. It doesn't. The average murder rate per 1000,000 people in U.S. states with capital punishment is about eight, while it is only 4.4 in states without the death penalty.
Glen, I don't want to pile on here, but listen to these statistics:
- Sixty-seven per cent of all law enforcement officers in the U.S. do not feel capital punishment decreases the rate of homicides. - Eighty-two per cent say that they don't believe criminals think about the punishment prior to or during the commission of their crime. - At least 160 children (I use the term loosely meaning youngsters under 18 when they committed the crime) have been sentenced to death since 1976.
Should I go on.
It goes without saying that modern DNA analysis has the potential of ruling out or in suspects in murder cases. With more advanced forensic weapons, there is all the more reason in calling a halt to the death penalty.
Currently there are 3,704 prisoners on death row in America awaiting execution. Glen, I believe It is reasonable to believe that several are innocent. Would you suggest they are just damned unlucky, and it doesn't hurt to kill a few innocents with the guilty.
Maybe you don't like dogs, old folks and children.
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More in the section:
Whither Ukraine? Who Represents the People?
The Death Penalty: Necessary to A Civilized Society
Read also previous issue' articles:
Are Ukraine's Political Habits Unique?
Is Ukraine's Economic Growth Speculation-led?
Ukraine is Drifting to the West - Slowly but Surely
The Unfinished Orange Revolution?
Vacuums, Reforms and the Need to Regain the Initiative
Pirates of the 21st century
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