[Vision2020] Re: Only the short sighted think Death Penalty Must Be Aboli...

[Ted Moffett]

Matt et. al.

To the extent that the USA allows legal practices that resemble the tactics
if a dictatorship, it has more potential to become one, a matter of degree.
If you recall, I said that the future potential to use the death penalty for
human rights abuses is reason enough to ban the practice, even when a
government appears as fair and certain about who it sentences to death as it
possibly can.  But no government can guarantee that in the future it will
not be compromised and become tyrannical.  One basic principle to guard
against this is to grant the government the most limited powers over its own
citizens consistent with fulfilling the functions of government.  It is
clear that life imprisonment without chance of parole can be substituted for
the death penalty while maintaining the governments ability to fulfill its
basic functions.  No chance of executing the innocent, unfairly applying the
death penalty to those who cannot afford the best defense or those who are
sentenced with a bias due to race or sex, and no slippery slope potential
for a tyrannical hysteria to result in the execution of prisoners for
political reasons, such as the questionable execution of the Rosenberg's
during the Joe McCarthy era.

In fact, in the USA, the unfair application of the death penalty more
frequently for the poor and some minorities, not to mention the unacceptable
number of innocents who have either been on death row or executed, are
examples of human rights abuses involving the application of the death
penalty in the USA.  Anyone can look up this information very easily, so I
won't list sources.

The US is now using torture to pursue the war on terror.  Does this make the
USA a dictatorship?  No, but justifying this practice, just as justifying
the death penalty, makes the USA closer to a dictatorship in its tactics and
philosophy, and again, just as with the death penalty, the use of torture
as a justified "legal" tactic has troubling potential for an expanded abuse
of this practice in the future.

If the death penalty was such a necessary tool for stopping crime and
maintaining order in society, we would see nations that do not use the death
penalty in some serious trouble regarding crime rates.  But many nations
without the death penalty have lower crime rates than the USA.  Again, this
is easy for anyone to verify, so I won't list sources.  Of course it could
be argued that they might have even lower crime rates if they used the death
penalty, but the claim that the death penalty is necessary to maintain basic
civil order is a very weak argument given the reality of the
social/political situation in many nations without the death penalty.

The bottom line for many death penalty supporters is the retribution
argument.  They view some crimes as being so egregious that only the death
penalty will balance the scales of justice.  For those who think this sort
of moral rule applies above all other considerations, it may be irrelevant
whether the death penalty might be abused in the future or whether or not
the death penalty is a reliable deterrent.

We could analyze this argument from the point of view of two opposing moral
principles that are a part of the Judeo-Christian ethical tradition: the Old
Testament's "an eye for an eye" or the New Testament's "turn the other
cheek" and/or "love your enemies."

It is an amazing expression of how the Bible can be interpreted in opposite
ways when it is used to both justify the use of the death penalty and to
argue against it, and in fact we see a rather severe chasm between millions
of serious Christians who think the death penalty a grave moral wrong, and
those who insist it is commanded by God if applied correctly.  Both sides
argue vehemently that they hold the moral high ground, yet both cannot be
right.

I appreciate the consistency of the Vatican's approach, being against
abortion and the death penalty as a matter of consistent application of
their moral principles, though I do support a women's right to choose, with
some limitations.

Luke 6:27 "But I say to you that listen, Love your enemies, do good to those
who hate you, 28 bless those who curse you, pray for those who abuse you. 29
If anyone strikes you on the cheek, offer the other also; and from anyone
who takes away your coat do not withhold even your shirt. 30 Give to
everyone who begs from you; and if anyone takes away your goods, do not ask
for them again. 31 Do to others as you would have them do to you.
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Ted Moffett
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