The BBC reports that Connecticut is now the 17th US State to have abolished the death penalty. One could say that 17 out of 50 is a rather depressing score, and it is, but it is the trend which I find immensely encouraging. For all of its faults, the US society is nevertheless slowly civilizing itself and that is remarkable considering the type of corporate Fascism which the US population is suffering under. Sure, the US still has the largest per capita incarceration rate on the planet, so-called “Supermax” prisons are growing, most sentencing guidelines as medieval, the idiotic “war on drugs” is still in full swing, the police state apparatus is growing, etc. And yet, civilization is slowly making its way up through the cracks of Far West barbarism and corporate Fascism:
A (kind of, mostly) Black man was elected President, including by a majority of White people. He turned out to be a fantastic liar and corporate puppet, but at least one very significant page of the long and ugly history of racism in the US has been turned.
Now, in the midst of an orgy of fear-mongering propaganda a US State abolishes the death penalty. As Roger Waters would say, Each small candle lights a corner of the dark.
OK, maybe I am naive, but I like to think that today, Connecticut is that small candle.
The Saker
Hi Saker,
Despite the prejudices and inequities that plague the criminal injustice system in the US, I have never believed that abolishing the death penalty is the answer. Life in prison amounts to a life of torture and “cruel or unusual punishment” for so many inmates, where the weak are raped and abused by the strong, and those who leave prison are psychologically damaged for life.
Abolishing the death penalty is just a bandaid to cover up a deeper problem; institutional injustice. Indeed, if the death penalty is abolished it could very well lead to even more institutional injustice, as judges and juries may be more likely to err on the side of their own prejudices if their consciences are not pricked by the possibility of sending someone to die.
As a sign of growth, I look at the Texas case of a white man executed for dragging a black man to his death while tied to a pickup truck. That’s progress in one of the most racist states in the country.
Peace
@Ishamid:Despite the prejudices and inequities that plague the criminal injustice system in the US, I have never believed that abolishing the death penalty is the answer
That depends, I think, on the question. Abolishing the death penalty does not, indeed, make the immense US “Gulag” any more civilized, I agree here. What I meant is something rather different. To be, the abolition of the death penalty is not a utilitarian goal, but an end in of itself. It’s not about the criminal, its about the society.
Most, if not all, primitive societies have the death penalty, alongside child labor, torture, slavery, wars of aggression, overt racism and a regime whose authority is based on force rather than a regime whose force is based on authority. However, with time, I believe that societies gradually come to look at these phenomena with disgust and, eventually, horror, and they get rid of them. This process of gradually shedding the most barbaric manifestations of a lack of civilization and education are, I believe, irreversible “social gains” to transpose the French expression “acquis sociaux”.
I vividly remember when in 1981 the French Socialists abolished death penalty under Minister of Justice Robert Badinter. Most of the French population was FOR the death penalty, and yet when the Socialists lost power, nobody on the Right proposed to restore it. The French society, as a whole, had literally turned the page. That does not mean that the French society became perfect, that all injustice was eliminated, but one specific type of barbarism was finally vomited out of the French nation.
The same goes, I strongly believe, for labor laws, torture, racism of wars of aggression. Once they are fully vomited up and ejected from the national psyche, there is no way back. I am, of course, very much aware that the likes of Obama, Sarkozy or Merkel are doing their utmost to reverse these historical trends in Europe, but I believe that they will fail in the long term. Europe as a whole cannot give up health care, a civilized labor code or social rights any more than it will restore the death penalty or torture. I am speaking of Western Europe here, of course. Central Europeans will do whatever the hell their US overlords tell them, precisely because they are not “real” Europeans, only wannabe Europeans.
Even in the USA I see clear signs that capitalism, as such, is gradually becoming discredited. Free trade is discredited for sure. Racism is being beat back ever day, and I strongly believe that young Americans are FAR less likely to suffer from racist pathologies than the 50+ generation. The idea that the problem of Palestine is very much a problem of racism is slowly making its way into the US collective consciousness, even amongst Jews. Even amongst the Bushite crazies, torture is looked at with some degree of disgust. The US labor laws still need to catch up with the laws of the civilized world, but the OWS and 99% movement is getting there.
And in this context, CN abolishes the death penalty. Yes, its a small step, but only one amongst many other small steps which all add up, don’t you think?
Kind regards,
The Saker
@VINEYARDSAKER
Hmm, your arguments for what constitute barbaric appear to me as quite emotivistic. In ethical emotivism the meanings of ethical terms such as ‘good’, ‘bad’, ‘civilized’, and ‘barbaric’ are functions of the sensibilities of a majority of the population. I have a feeling that you are much more of an objectivist in ethics than an emotivist. Western/liberal-capitalist secularism generally uses emotivist arguments in morals to e.g., condemn traditional values, carry the “White Man’s Burden” of “civilizing other cultures”, banning hijab (e.g. France) etc etc.
As Alasdair MacIntyre decisively argues in After Virtue, emotivism ultimately leads to a relativism of values where ethical terms are ultimately devoid of meaning. So although I appreciate the emotive force of your argument, it appears to me to lack the objective force.
In my view, CN abolishing the death penalty only has value in the context of a broken (in)justice system where defendants are not treated equally: If one has some combination of money, power, white skin, etc. one will be treated differently than someone without it. So the motivation to prevent an innocent person from being executed is a good one.
OTOH, a life of rape, torture and degradation is no good either.
The emotivist argument takes on more power in a secular society because of the rejection of, or suspension of belief in, life after death. If one holds that only this phase of life is really life, then the death penalty appears much more “final”.
As a general rule, the fair and just application of the death penalty for 1st-degree murder, 1st degree rape, 1st-degree treason is just. Consciously committing these acts involves a forfeiture of the the personal right and privilege to life, and the victim or the victim’s family has the right to demand the ultimate retribution in those cases. Both divine law and objective ethics would appear to support this in my view. I see nothing especially civilized about paying $70,000 per year to incarcerate a 1st-degree murderer, and turn him/her into more of a socio/psychpath than he was when he went in.
Peace
@VINEYARDSAKER
Hmm, your arguments for what constitute barbaric appear to me as quite emotivistic. In ethical emotivism the meanings of ethical terms such as ‘good’, ‘bad’, ‘civilized’, and ‘barbaric’ are functions of the sensibilities of a majority of the population. I have a feeling that you are much more of an objectivist in ethics than an emotivist. Western/liberal-capitalist secularism generally uses emotivist arguments in morals to e.g., condemn traditional values, carry the “White Man’s Burden” of “civilizing other cultures”, banning hijab (e.g. France) etc etc.
As Alasdair MacIntyre decisively argues in After Virtue, emotivism inexorably leads to a relativism of values where ethical terms are ultimately devoid of meaning. So although I appreciate the emotive force of your argument, it appears to me to lack the objective force.
In my view, CN abolishing the death penalty only has value in the context of a broken (in)justice system where defendants are not treated equally: If one has some combination of money, power, white skin, etc. one will be treated differently than someone without it. So the motivation to prevent an innocent person from being executed is a good one.
OTOH, a life of rape, torture and degradation is no good either.
The emotivist argument takes on more power in a secular society because of the rejection of, or suspension of belief in, life after death. If one holds that only this phase of life is really life, then the death penalty appears much more “final”.
As a general rule, the fair and just application of the death penalty for 1st-degree murder, 1st degree rape, 1st-degree treason is just. Consciously committing these acts involves a forfeiture of the the personal right and privilege to life, and the victim or the victim’s family has the right to demand the ultimate retribution in those cases. Both divine law and objective ethics would appear to support this in my view. I see nothing especially civilized about paying $70,000 per year to incarcerate a 1st-degree murderer, and turn him/her into more of a socio/psychpath than he was when he went in.
[Aside: I’ve always found it ironic that the Right holds life before birth as sacred while leaving it to the whims of social darwinism after birth. The Left holds the life of murderers and the like sacred while leaving life before birth to the vicissitudes of social darwinism. Both of them are bankrupt in my view.]
Peace
PS
From your first reply here I guess you must be in a more optimistic mood than usual. You are usually a lot more sanguine about American society… Was it your recent trip?
:-) :-) :-)
Another barbaric practice to add to the list is abortion and infanticide. The U.S. has the most “liberal” (i.e., permissive) law in the Western world in this regard. Again, it is the young who are calling this more and more into question. I expect that the days of abortion on demand are numbered.
It was the Baby Boomer generation (my generation!) and their immediate predecessors, the so-called “Silent” generation, who pushed through abortion on demand, no-fault divorce, and other measures aimed at destroying the family. The Silent are mostly dead by now, and after the Boomers are gone, they will not be able to rule from the grave on this issue, whatever they may think of themselves.
I consider my own contemporaries to be an enormous millstone and sash-weight hindering true moral progress in America and the Anglosphere as a whole. From what I can see, the moral instincts of the young seem more healthy.
Unfortunately, a huge countervailing current is the embrace by the young of the absurdity of homosexual “marriage.” I can only hope they grow out of this folly as they grow older.
@Ishamid: your arguments for what constitute barbaric appear to me as quite emotivistic
Maybe. Probably. I cannot deny that I abhor the death penalty, child labor, torture, slavery, wars of aggression, racism and authoritarianism. To me these are all, in a philosophical sense, crimes against humanity, crimes against our common humanity. In regards to the death penalty, I am probably not as naive as I sound. There are circumstances where a state, any state, must fight for its very survival, and where that survival can only be secured by killing of some people hell bent on the destruction of the state and, through it, the destruction of a society. But what we are discussing here is a form of war, not justice.
What I reject is not the right of a state, of a nation, to defend itself, but the deliberate killing of a person as a punishment, retribution or deterrent. In the deepest sense, the execution of a human being is, to me, a blasphemy against God – there is no crime which “deserves” or justifies the deliberate execution of a person. For one thing, there is no civilized way of executing somebody. The more “sanitized” the entire procedure is, the more inhumane and barbaric it is. The US is a pathetic example of trying to civilize the death penalty. In China they shoot you, in the KSA, they behead you, but in the USA they go through a grotesque pseudo-civilized procedure aimed at guaranteeing the “rights” of the person being executed, which only results into an even MORE barbaric and grotesque horror. Then there is the fact that the death penalty denies the possibility of repentance, which I also reject. So yes, I am emotional about it, as I consider it a barbaric practice incompatible with my (admittedly subjective) understanding of “civilized”.
So although I appreciate the emotive force of your argument, it appears to me to lack the objective force.
True. Its like anti-racist arguments, they also always lack objective force. There is a point where some things are self-evidently true for some, and not for others. To me, there is no need to objectively and scientifically “prove” that “races” are a meaningless concept, or that all humans, regardless of race, are equally precious and loved by God and God-fearing humans. Some racist/racialists spend a great deal of time and effort trying to distinguish between races, and some even want to compare and contrast them. To me, these efforts are not wrong, they are meaningless, as I refuse, ON PRINCIPLE, to categorize humans according to the concept of “race” (which I hold to be a fiction, to begin with). For me, racism, just like the death penalty, are axiomatically wrong. I don’t need arguments with objective force to reject them.
As a general rule, the fair and just application of the death penalty for 1st-degree murder, 1st degree rape, 1st-degree treason is just. Consciously committing these acts involves a forfeiture of the the personal right and privilege to life, and the victim or the victim’s family has the right to demand the ultimate retribution in those cases. Both divine law and objective ethics would appear to support this in my view.
That is, in my opinion, a legalistic approach. My view of the death penalty is not legalistic, it is religious: God through His prophets taught: Shall I at all desire death of the sinner, saith he Lord, as I desire that he should turn from his evil way, and live? (Ezekiel 18:23 LXX) and Thus saith the Lord; As I live, I desire not the death of the ungodly, as that the ungodly should turn from his way and live (Ezekiel 33:11 LXX). Who are we to take a life which God created?
@Ishamid (continued):
I see nothing especially civilized about paying $70,000 per year to incarcerate a 1st-degree murderer. I do. I see it in the fact that financial considerations are not part of the civilized decision-making process about human life.
From your first reply here I guess you must be in a more optimistic mood than usual. You are usually a lot more sanguine about American society…
I am not more optimistic, I think, I just see the signs of a gradual and slow, but real, change.
Was it your recent trip? Maybe. But does any light, no matter how small, seem brighter when seen in complete darkness? ;-)
@Michael: Another barbaric practice to add to the list is abortion and infanticide
While I do consider abortions as the killing of a human soul, I also see abortions only as a symptom of a deeper problem: a fundamentally dysfunctional society. The fixation of many Americans on abortion seems rather bizarre for me. What if no abortions were committed, would that really solve the real problem? I don’t think so.
Its like gun control which polarizes the US society into two equally crazy camps to me: guns are NOT the issue, their misuse is just a symptom of a much deeper problem.
Getting rid of abortions and guns will solve nothing, imho. What needs to be addressed are not the symptoms, but their causes.
My 2cts.
@VINEYARDSAKER
I believe that placing the death penalty for the highest acts of human criminality on the same plane as the acts of criminality themselves is a kind of category mistake. Life is a divine gift but also a responsibility. Human beings, by the very fact of their freedom of will, also have the power to forfeit the Gift that God gave them. To deny capital punishment is to deny that aspect of our free will.
From the scriptural point of view, the Prophets of the Bible generally support the death penalty, and there is evidence in the New Testament that Jesus Christ did as well. In his Sermon on the Mount, Jesus did soften the received Mosaic laws somewhat, but he did not abolish the death penalty for appropriate crimes. Given the immense value of human life — so much that the Qur’an equates one murder with killing the whole world — if capital punishment were wrong Jesus or one of the other Prophets would have said so explicitly and unambiguously. The argument that Jesus was anti-capital punishment is anachronistic.
“…he who kills with the sword must be killed with the sword. Here is the patience and the faith of the saints. Rev. 13:10”
Note the emphasis on patience here. It appears to refer to the fact that the saints — the Lovers of God — in their love of humanity have to be patient with God’s law of capital punishment in special cases. For patience is of three kinds:
patience with adversity
patience with ease
patience with the divine commandments
So despite the invaluable human spirit of mercy that reflects the divine Mercy, the divine Wisdom that gives the heirs of a murder victim the right to seek justice in court must be respected, with patience if necessary. For God gives the right of retribution to the heirs of the victim. This answers your question: “Who are we to take a life which God created?”
Another aspect is that the death penalty is a defense of society just as a just war involves the defense of the society. If you are on a boat, and one person on the boat insists on drilling holes at the bottom, eventually that fellow will have to be thrown overboard for the sake of the rest of the folks on the boat. So “Who are we to take a life which God created?” We are created in the Image of God and have a responsibility to the people of this Ship we have been placed upon to not let holes be dug in it, and to carry out the Law of God and the Law of Justice in the best possible way.
Finally, I don’t understand how capital punishment gets in the way of repentance. There are countless murderers who have repented before their executions, and no one stops them from doing so. Nor does capital punishment get in the way of forgiveness.
And God Knows Best.
Peace
@Ishamid:I believe that placing the death penalty for the highest acts of human criminality on the same plane as the acts of criminality themselves is a kind of category mistake.
Yes, absolutely. This is why society has to act by a set of standards of a very different nature than criminal societies were, for example, retribution or reparations are commonly used as a standard of “justice”. Applying the death penalty drags the society down to the level of the punished criminal and this is precisely the result of a category mistake.
In his Sermon on the Mount, Jesus did soften the received Mosaic laws somewhat, but he did not abolish the death penalty for appropriate crimes.
That is simply because Christ was not a legislator. His entire teaching is spiritual in nature, not legal. His call is not to change laws, but to change *humans*.
The argument that Jesus was anti-capital punishment is anachronistic
Yes, as it makes it sound like Christ joined Amnesty International or some similar political organization. Nor did He join any anti-slavery or anti-racist organization. That is not how Christianity works. But those who were illuminated by baptism and steeped in patristic though eventually turned away from such barbaric and uncivilized practices, if not en masse and as societies, then at least as individuals. Christianity *never* “works” at a mass level, but only inside the heart of each individual human being.
“…he who kills with the sword must be killed with the sword.
Well, sure, this is consistent with “for all they that take the sword shall perish with the sword” (Matt 26:52), this is, if you want, just a “Christian statement of karma” and not a normative commandment to use swords.
. For God gives the right of retribution to the heirs of the victim.
This is where Christianity and Islam disagree I suppose
Finally, I don’t understand how capital punishment gets in the way of repentance. There are countless murderers who have repented before their executions, and no one stops them from doing so. Nor does capital punishment get in the way of forgiveness.
From the point of view of the criminal it is quite possible to repent before being executed. And from the point of view of the victim, it is possible to forgive the criminal before his execution. But a society which executes its members either preempts or ignores these possibilities by over-ruling spiritual phenomena (repentance and/or forgiveness) on legal(istic) grounds.
With all due respect, my friend, all your arguments are true for the pre-Christian Jewish society, but I think that you are overlooking to what degree they are incompatible with Christian spirituality (which, of course, you have the full right to reject and disagree with!).
Again, there is no such thing as a Christian prohibition of the death penalty. True. And various Christian individuals and societies have held different views on this topic. And yet I would argue that the original, Patristic, Christian spirituality is overwhelmingly opposed to the death penalty and that historically, a majority of those who immersed themselves into this spirituality came to that conclusion.
My 2cts.
Personally I would rather have the death penalty if I were a criminal than sit in a prison cell for 21 hours a day.
The extraordinary thing about US executions is the theatrical way they are performed with gas chambers, electric chairs and lethal injections rather than doing a much simpler and more humane practice of a single gun shot to the back of the head like they did in the USSR.