Compassionate Europe and the death penalty
I noticed (hat tip: Pajamas Media) that some Europeans may be reconsidering their near-total abolition of the death penalty.
This is surprising news, if true; the recent history of the death penalty in Europe has only gone one way, and that’s in the direction of ending it. It’s been an incredibly successful post-World War II campaign, understandable in many respects in light of the carnage that the war represented, and the desire to turn away from killing. The UN and international human rights groups led the way in the late 40s and the 50s, and all the nations of Europe save Belarus have followed suit. One cannot become a member of the EU without abolishing capital punishment.
It’s another manner by which Europe distinguishes itself from the US–although it should be remembered that the US had its own fling with the European way, abolishing the death penalty (de facto) for a decade from 1967 till 1977 as a result of Furman vs. Georgia‘s Supreme Court ruling that the practice was arbitrary and capricious, and cruel and unusual. Technically, the death penalty wasn’t abolished by the case, but it effectively generated a moratorium while people tried to figure out just exactly what the ruling meant, and how the states should respond to it.
At any rate, the European poll figures are interesting, because–despite the longing of the EU–Europe is certainly far from unitary. As might be expected, Eastern Europe (“new” Europe) leads the way in death penalty support, with 58% of Poles wanting to bring the death penalty back (Poland only came aboard recently, anyway, in 1997), and 56% of Czechs.
But even in France the numbers seem relatively close, and in England public opinion is virtually tied on the subject. England, of course, has a long and colorful history of historically significant beheadings, with the site of many becoming a tourist attraction. And don’t forget the bloodthirsty French Revolution.
But those days are gone in Europe–probably never to return, whatever the people might think. The law, once officially changed, is unlikely to ever change back, despite the fact that the obvious alternative to the death penalty–life imprisonment–is rarely enforced in Europe.
I speak here as a person who is not a strong proponent of the death penalty, although I reluctantly favor it in certain cases. For the individual criminal, its application has been capricious and unfair in too many cases. Life imprisonment–if it actually is life with no possibility of parole–is a decent alternative, often more feared by criminals than death.
But I recognize exceptions, even for individual criminals. For example, a New Yorker article a few years back (can’t find the cite right now) described a multiple murderer who was also a brilliant escape artist. No prison could safely hold him, and he seemed to be the sort who would kill again: an argument for the death penalty if there ever was one. And I always knew that mass murderers of the political sort, such as Hitler (and now, Saddam) cried out for a punishment that was definitive. Keeping them alive after their particular crimes seemed more of an obscenity than killing them.
Most of Europe does not agree. And it’s especially the elites of many European countries who don’t always agree with their people.
In Italy and Spain it’s true that the people are overwhelmingly against the death penalty, to the tune of 72% and 80%, respectively (and Italy, by the way, was the birthplace of the modern movement to abolish capital punishment). But take a look at some poll figures from Europe concerning Saddam Hussein’s execution, widely condemned by the leaders of Europe and the international groups there:
When the German magazine Stern commissioned a poll on whether Saddam should be executed, it found 50 percent of Germans in favor and only 39 percent opposed. A poll conducted last month for Le Monde found that most Americans (82 percent) favored hanging Saddam ”” as did most Spaniards (51 percent), most Germans (53 percent), most French (58 percent), and most Britons (69 percent).
But the rulers of Europe widely condemned Saddam’s execution–not just the form it took, but the fact of it as well.
Here are some more figures:
“Polls show that Europeans and Canadians crave executions almost as much as their American counterparts do,” wrote Joshua Micah Marshall in The New Republic in 2000. “It’s just that their politicians don’t listen to them.”
The figures Marshall goes on to quote (from a 1997 poll) are even more strongly in favor of capital punishment than the figures cited earlier in this post, which showed much softer death penalty support in Europe. But whatever the numbers mean (and we all know about polls and their vagaries), it’s pretty clear that even if the people of Europe were clamoring for a death penalty, the law would be unlikely to change to reflect public opinion. The elites wouldn’t have it, and they seem to be in control.
Its lack of a death penalty is one of the things that distinguishes Europe today. It is part of Europe’s own self-image as an evolved and pacifist culture, leading the way for the world and especially the American cowboys, who are both bloodthirsty and naive. To be the champions of the right to life for even a mass murderer and sadist such as Saddam Hussein is, they believe, the mark of a culture that will lead the world to a better way, where the lion will lie down with the lamb because that lamb’s superior moral force is so extraordinarily compelling.
Would that it were so. Nor do I believe the opposite–that executing someone such as Saddam will dissuade future power-grabbing mass murderers from lusting after the reigns of whatever chaotic and failed countries they can get their hands on. No, I’m afraid that nothing but the proper Constitutional safeguards, and an informed and aware populace, are likely to be sufficient to stop those with such lofty ambitions.
“But those days are gone in Europe–probably never to return, whatever the people might think. The law, once officially changed, is unlikely to ever change back…”
…until Sharia is instituted in Eurabia!
I wonder if the US Supreme Court will rethink its death penalty decisions, given that the recent ones were based in part on evolving international laws against capital punishment?
Alas, Neo, there’s simply no evidence that the death penalty prevents crime of any kind. In fact, the signs seem to be that having capital punishment increases capital offences.
Sure, once in a blue moon you may find a Houdini murderer whom no prison can hold, but on balance all you end up with is a pile of dead innocents when you execute those wrongly accused, and when you execute the guilty all you get is the realization that no day-dream of revenge will compensate for the losses you’ve suffered.
As for Saddam, do you really think the fear of execution bothers a dictator or would-be dictator? Being a militar dictator is not exactly a safe profession; most of them have to murder quite a bit to get to the top, and keep murdering once they’re there. The idea that you can scare them with threats of death is nothing new; they live with it every day.
When will politicians realize that there are some criminals who are the essence of evil? So evil that they have forfeited the right to live. Bundy, Dahmer, Hitler, and Hussein are representative of this class.
Elimination of the death penalty is acceptable if it is replaced by special prisons like Devil’s Island and the Soviet Gulags where the evil ones would be confined for lifetime of extreme suffering and misery. Nothing less is acceptable.
I have the impression that in Europe, as elsewhere, the population tends to be more conservative – it’s the media and cultural elite who are mostly on the Left, and so this gives a false idea of the society. But the man on the street is pretty much against unrestricted immigration, leniency with murderers and terrorists, etc.
I’m not sure if I’m in favor of the death penalty, but I think that it’s basic message is, “this is wrong, so wrong that if you do it you’ll die”.
I have no problem with child-killers being executed, for instance. They know what they did.
Religiously, I can see how one could have an issue with the death penalty, however, and I understand the Church’s view of it.
The main problem of the death penalty, for me, is that you may execute an innocent person by mistake, or that it may be abused in certain types of government.
But there are too many relativists among us have a problem in defining good and evil, and manage to excuse all sorts of behavior.
For me it was strange to see people condemning the execution of Saddam, knowing that he himself condemned thousands to death even without a jury, knowing that far more innocent people where killed by suicide bombers the same day, and knowing that all over the Arab world the death penalty (for far sillier “crimes”, such as being raped) is still very common.
As for Saddam, do you really think the fear of execution bothers a dictator or would-be dictator? Being a military dictator is not exactly a safe profession; most of them have to murder quite a bit to get to the top, and keep murdering once they’re there. The idea that you can scare them with threats of death is nothing new; they live with it every day.
It’s not death per se they fear, silly person. It’s the humiliation of being condemned and hanged by the yokels who properly belong under your boot. That’s why Hitler killed himself rather than be tried and hung by those barbarian Russians for whom he had such contempt.
Last week I watched a recent German film on Sophie Scholl, a member of the White Rose resistance group in Munich who was executed in early 1943. In an attached video, they mentioned that it was the 1980s before Germany began to “rehabilitate”–meaning declare innocent–those who’d been convicted of opposing Nazism.
The first thought that flashed through my mind was a radical contrast. In the late 1940s Germany’s political leaders scrambled to ban the death penalty for the all too obvious reason that it would exempt many of them from such a penalty. Contrast that to the some forty years it took them to overturn, in a judicial sense, Nazism’s more outrageous legal judgments.
No, I don’t think Germany’s abolition of the death penalty had anything to do with revulsion against Nazi crimes against humanity. If it had, nulling those judgments against the regime’s opponents would have been at the top of their list–particularly the executions.
For some 40 years after Sophie’s Scholl execution she was a criminal justly executed under Germany law, while the nation’s political class, concerned about their own necks, could have cared less.
Something similar, I’ve been told, happened to the very few who lost government posts in the 1930s because they refused to assist the Nazis. Their careers were destroyed, their state pensions were lost, and many were left in poverty after the war. Nothing was done to help them for an all too obvious reason. They demonstrated that it was possible to keep your integrity under the Nazis.
–Michael W. Perry, Seattle, editor of Dachau Liberated
“Jeff in NY” said what I was going to say.
If you put them in jail for life, the Left will complain that life in prison is too hard.
It really never ends with them. They don’t feel any need for justice. The criminal didn’t hurt them, they are still comfy in their little cocoon.
It is all about being Holier-than-thou. It is all about looking down your nose at other people and saying “I am better than you, because I am [more moral | have higher SAT scores | live in a higher tax bracket | use my Saturdays to go where I don’t live, scream, block traffic, and make the real resident’s lives miserable].”
Do you think these people really care about the criminal? No. They care about bitching and complaining about society.
1000 years ago they would be walking around in hair-shirts while whipping themselves, still screaming “Look at me! Look at me! I am better than you.”
Except 1000 years ago they wouldn’t have had TV cameras to turn them into heroes. 1000 yards ago they would not have been able to pretend that their narcissistic antics had any relevance to something important like Dr. King. In modern times, they don’t have to justify their actions, they can just step on the back of the black man, Dr. King, and use his labour to gain themselves some respect.
However, you cheapen the victims suffering, it will never be too little. I remember, 2 years ago, the guy over in Europe who got convicted of blowing up an airliner. He only served 2 days per life taken. How cheap are the victims’ lives?
Only if you are of a proper racial or social class are the crimes not enough. White? Male? Christian? No baying at the moon for you to have justice. Instead we have extra time for you based on the colour of your skin, or gender, or beliefs. We have Hate Crime for you.
Why? Because to the Left you are Der Juden, and the Left’s hate is politically correct hate.
To think that this involves Justice to the Left really misses their motivations and beliefs.
Elitism first and foremost.
Obsession with caste (be it race, gender, or sexuality) second.
Zeno’s understanding of the issue matches mine – Europe in general banned capital punishment not on the basis of wide dislike, but of elite dislike.
“that executing someone such as Saddam will dissuade future power-grabbing mass murderers”
Think of all the innocents that would have been kidnapped/killed to negotiate his release from prison.
Also consider that Iraqi’s have Battered Wife Syndrome re Saddam. They need the certainty that he’s not coming back to power.
A comment on the religious angle.
Please remember the 10 commandments do NOT say “Thou shall not kill”, but in the original Hebrew “Thou shall not murder”. You can thank the King James Bible for cementing this error into AngloSheperic Christianity.
“Kill” in English is an all-encompassing verb that covers the taking of life in all forms and for all classes of victims. That kind of generalization is expressed in Hebrew through the verb “harag.” However, the verb that appears in the Torah’s prohibition is a completely different one, “ratsah” which, it would seem, should be rendered “murder.” This root refers only to criminal acts of killing.
If you have ever read the Old Testament you will notice the God is just fine with plenty of forms of killing. If fact, God himself kills off every 1st born Egyptian male a few pages before the 10 Commandments.
If it is not _murder_ (and murder has always had a pretty legal definition), it is not prohibited by the 10 Commandments.
Loyal Achates says it doesn’t deter crime. Well, from what I can see, Saddam Hussein will never commit another crime. Sounds like a lot of crime has been deterred.
It is curious that Europeans have no problem with doctors executing people for the crimes of being old or disabled…oh wait, they call that euthanasia, don’t they? We Americans just have to rename the practice, the euthanizing of sociopaths
It is inevitable that Europe will restore the death penalty, once the Muslims approach majority status. After all, there are plenty of apostates and infidels who are just asking to be beheaded, right?
Lee — the death penalty does not so much reduce crime as it eliminates recividism.
That said, I belong to the school that we need a death penalty as a statement by society — Do “X” and you die. I tend to favor a very constrained “X” — to me it should be limited to crimes of intentionally taking another human life for gain. That is the bright line I wish for society to draw.
Hey neo-neocon
Calling anyone who does not agree with you an elitist is just plain dumb.
No wonder all your old pals look at you and think what a dunce you have become.
Are they all elitists.
Do you sit around the dinner table with you family and old friends telling them they are elitists who have no real connection with a working stiff like yourself.
Of course you don’t say on this as what remains of your old friendships and connections with family would be utterly shredded.
Instead you come onto your dumb blog and tell the world that anyone who doesn’t think like you is an elitist.
You are Exhibit A as to why blogs are just the crap rantings of the ignorant.
[From neo-neocon: Elite Man, I’ve left your charming comment up as an example of–well, of your charming self. You are now banned, however, for rudeness. Disagreement is fine, insulting me is not.]
Edited By Siteowner
“You are Exhibit A as to why blogs are just the crap rantings of the ignorant.”
And you are Exhibit A of Neo’s thesis. Thanks for the perfect illustration.
I agree with Lee; the death penalty may not be a deterrent to all, but it certainly deters the executed criminal. Studies have shown (I’m not going to cite them, sorry, but I remember this from Criminal Justice classes) that it is the certainty of punishment, not the punishment itself that acts as a deterrent. Capital offenses should be very carefully tried, but once convicted, and all appeals exhausted, I have no problem with executing a criminal for whose crime society has determined a capital punishment. It’s simply a rule of society, and, if enforced equally and with certainty in all cases, I believe that there would be a deterrent effect.
You are Exhibit A as to why blogs are just the crap rantings of the ignorant.
How about those who rail against “crap rantings”?
I noticed (hat tip: Pajamas Media) that some Europeans may be reconsidering their near-total abolition of the death penalty.
Wow, you don’t say.
But those days are gone in Europe–probably never to return, whatever the people might think.
Or want. Since their gov isn’t by the people, for the people.
despite the fact that the obvious alternative to the death penalty–life imprisonment–is rarely enforced in Europe.
Why would they enforce it? If they don’t have the will to kill people, why would they have the determination to keep them in jail forever? Human nature problem there. The Left tried to engineer that problem out… didn’t work.
I speak here as a person who is not a strong proponent of the death penalty, although I reluctantly favor it in certain cases. For the individual criminal, its application has been capricious and unfair in too many cases. Life imprisonment–if it actually is life with no possibility of parole–is a decent alternative, often more feared by criminals than death.
As I’ve gone over this issue with Michelle (photographer), the two options are not really life or death. It is more life or life+death. If you recall California’s 25 years in prison then death.
“It’s just that their politicians don’t listen to them.”
Since when did Social Democracies ever actually, you know, represent the people? It was always about rule through aristocracy.
The elites wouldn’t have it, and they seem to be in control.
As is natural without the 2nd Ammendment.
Alas, Neo, there’s simply no evidence that the death penalty prevents crime of any kind.0Acha
Don’t worry Neo, they are just dense. Either they know what you said, or they don’t care. Either way.
Calling anyone who does not agree with you an elitist is just plain dumb.
Well obviously people who disagree with neo tend to be rather low on the totem pole. Rather than at the top.
Europe in general banned capital punishment not on the basis of wide dislike, but of elite dislike.
Sigivald | 02.02.07 – 4:13 pm | #
Harsh. True, but harsh.
“As is natural without the 2nd Ammendment.“:
If it is true that the “Elite” are the control freaks that you say they are then you can be sure that they would control the well regulated militias as well as everything else. So a 2nd Amendment would achieve nothing.
“Alas, Neo, there’s simply no evidence that the death penalty prevents crime of any kind”
I don’t have the exact stats with me here, but I can assure you that the recidivism rate for convicts who have been executed is very, very low.
Don’t forget that many murderers who spend life in prison continue to murder, even if they don’t get out. Some kill fellow prisoners or prison guards; others order hits from the inside, especially if they’re connected with some kind of crime organization (Mafia or gang or jihad).
In this case, killing a murderer isn’t so much a matter of punishment as it is to prevent the murderer from killing again.
Also addressing the religious question, after the commandment says “Thou shalt not murder,” the Law of Moses goes on to prescribe methods of killing animals and sets forth methods of carrying out capital punishment. Christians can argue that Christ’s fulfillment of the Law abolishes animal sacrifice, but there is nothing in the New Testament that addresses capital punishment per se.
Those who argue that capital punishment does not deter capital crimes need ask themselves this: of those people who commit capital crimes, how many
(a) are caught?
(b) are charged?
(c) go to trial (as opposed to a plea deal)?
(d) are convicted?
(e) receive the death penalty?
(f) are executed?
Before you get to (f), any number of things could happen to prevent you from meeting your maker. Unless a punishment is swift and sure, it has little deterrent effect. Saudi Arabia’s streets are safe because of their draconian justice system.
Not that I advocate anything approaching the Saudi system. I just mean to point out that the “it doesn’t deter crime” argument doesn’t hold water. If you oppose capital punishment, and there are many valid reasons for doing so, you should abandon lack of deterrence as one of your reasons.
One of my friends used to teach school in Venezuela. He told me about watching government payrolls being delivered to various official buildings: flatbed trucks with armed troops would pull up in front of the building and toss bags of cash onto the sidewalk. The bags would remain—sometimes for hours—until somebody in the official building picked them up and took them inside. They remained safely on the sidewalks because anyone who took them and was caught was summarily executed on the spot. So I’d say the death penalty was an effective deterrent in this case.
I suspect the death penalty will come out of disfavor. Terrorism will make it so. I can recall now the smothered revulsion from CNN and the MSM when the Bush administration flatly stated that death was the penalty for terrorists in the field. “Kill them first.” It nauseated the media. But such must eventually entered our court rooms. We will not have the luxury of debating the fates of mass murderers in future terrorist events. Saddam was just an early farce; and it was a farce wasn’t it?
It’s about executing justice.
Assuming that by “often” you meant “never,” I agree. First degree murderers routinely plead guilty in exchange for life without parole to avoid a death sentence. Has any killer ever pleaded guilty in exchange for death to avoid life without parole?
Aside from preventing certain crimes, the existence of the death penalty also satisfies the desire for justice.
Saddam is a good example–he got what he deserved. Jeffrey Dahmer should have been executed. It took a fellow convict to kill him, thus providing justice.
Why should killers like the two Washington, D.C. snipers, get away with murder and not be executed? The families of their victims did not receive justice. That’s not right. People should not be encouraged to go around killing others, and the death penalty helps deter that impulse.
No, I can’t prove this, but it’s common sense.
“Has any killer ever pleaded guilty in exchange for death to avoid life without parole?”
Banzai Bob Vickers (last name may be wrong) in Arizona during the moratorium on the death penalty. He continued killing prisoners, a guard too if my memory serves, attempting to be put to death. He demanded it, he did not want life imprisonment. They did finally give him his wish.
xrlq: Gary Gilmore, the first man executed in the US after the capital punishment ban was lifted, wanted to be executed, which isn’t exactly what you are asking about, but close to it. Specifically, he wanted death by a firing squad. See this fascinating book by his brother.
On the issue of deterrence: note that my opposition to capital punishment in “ordinary” cases (which makes me, by the way, uncomfortable close to the viewpoint of those those European “elites” I supposedly excoriate because they disagree with me, according to our new Australian troll “elite man”) is based on its inherently inequitable application. Arguing deterrence vs. failure to deter is a whole other issue, so complex I haven’t tackled it here.
To Loyal Achates: I wonder about your reading comprehension. Or perhaps it’s your patience. Because clearly, when you write: “As for Saddam, do you really think the fear of execution bothers a dictator or would-be dictator?” you have either not read or not understood the last paragraph of my post. Go back and actually read it.
At a knee-jerk level, I never really understood death penalty for terrorism. Isn’t martyrdom what they want?
I agree with the comedian Ron White, what Osama isn’t prepared for is being forced to lick jelly out of Deshantay’s nether-regein every Friday night for the next 30 years.
Of course, the problem is you have two options (a) keep Osama et al. alive and turn them into celebrities for the rest of their incarcerated lives, costing individual cells, and expensive upkeep, possibly to be freed, or (b) kill ’em, give them what they want, and risk have them turning into Che t-shirts.
The least bad choice is “kill ’em”
If you can’t face the truth and deal with it at the proper time–you’re going to have to try to deal with it when everything’s going to hell. Europe seems to be choosing the latter approach.
Europe will wake up to the new reality only when it is forced to wake up. One or two muslim nukes in densely populated areas might just do the trick.
Skimming the comments, has everyone just ignored the utilitarian reasons for taking some of these people out of commission? In Iraq, while it hasn’t stopped the fighting, Saddam’s execution made clear to his supporters that he’s not coming back, no matter what they do. Some have written that this has depressed and enervated the Baathist body. I see “J” above mentioned this- “the recidivim rates of those executed…” I agree. Terrorists can still operate from jail cells sometimes, as with Guantanamo, aided by their lawyers. They can’t do much dead.
This Book Changed my mind about The Death Penalty -A Book Recommendation-they call this book the companion book to John Grisham’s The Innocent Man,The title is Journey Toward Justice by Dennis Fritz. Journey Toward Justice is a testimony to the Triumph of the human Spirit and is a Memoir. Dennis Fritz was wrongfully convicted of murder after a swift trail. The only thing that saved him from the Death Penalty was a lone vote from a juror. Dennis Fritz was the other Innocent man mentioned in John Grisham’s Book The Innocent Man. The Innocent Man by John Grisham is all about Ronnie Williamson, Dennis fritz’s co-defendant Ronnie Williamson was sentenced to the Death Penalty. Both were exonerated after spending 12 years in prison. The real killer was one of the Prosecution’s Key Witness. . John Grisham’s The Innocent Man tells half the story. Dennis Fritz’s Story needs to be heard. Look for his book in book stores or at Amazon.com. Toward Justice by Dennis Fritz, Publisher Seven Locks Press 2006.
Read about how he wrote hundreds of letters and appellate briefs in his own defense and immersed himself in an intense study of law. He was a school teacher and a ordinary man whose wife was brutally murdered in 1975 by a 17 year old neighbor and was raising his young daughter alone before he was accused.
Read about how he saw miracles and heard God Say “Trust Me”. He never blamed the Lord and soley relied on his faith in God to make it through. He waited for God’s time and never gave up. Please share this story.
You’re right, Michael, maybe we got the wrong “Saddam.” There might be a million of them in Iraq.
Most Europeans aren’t against the death penalty. They’re against giving their governments that power because they’ve so recently seen it’s utter and dramatic misuse. When asked about cases that are ‘poster boys’ for capital punishment, they’ll generally concede that it would be just. Well, except for the elites anyway.
As for the argument that the potential for an innocent man being executed- First, it’s pretty rare. Sure, there are cases like Fritz and Williamson, but they weren’t executed, were they? That’s why we don’t do it summarily. Also, we cannot allow the imperfect to prevent us from doing the good and just act of executing deserving criminals, any more than we would ban imprisonment because some men have been wrongly imprisoned. It’s about justice, and respect for Human life. If you so devalue human life by taking it at your lesiure, you shall have it taken from you as just reward. To not utilize the death penalty is to allow those who trivialize life to get away with it by living themselves.
The Christian argument hasn’t come up here yet, but I always wanted someone to answer me this: If God thought capital punishment was so bad, why, when Jesus was being crucified, did he say nothing about it being wrong? When one of the criminals crucified with him mocked him, the other said to him to shut it, we deserved this, he did not. Now that was the golden opportunity for Jesus to say, ‘no one deserves this punishment’, yet he did not. He simply promised the repentant criminal that he would get his heavenly reward. What of that, if you belive that Christians should be against the death penalty for religious reasons?
My work as a prosecutor sometimes involves dealing with the death penalty in the appellate stages. It has changed my opinion about the death penalty.
Basically, I think that it takes up too much of our resources. You would not believe the time, money, and energy devoted to those who bring appeals on behalf of prisoners on Death Row. It takes an inordinate amount of our time to respond ,and an inordinate amount of court time that could be devoted to trying cases to begin with.
It’s also strange which cases get capital punishment and which don’t. I haven’t seen any cases where it seemed like the defendant didn’t deserve it, but I’ve seen many where the guy who gets life in prison instead of death is at least as bad as those who do end up being sentenced to death.
I do wonder what all the zealous anti-death attorneys will do with their time if and when capital punishment is eliminated. My guess is that they will not stop; they will turn their attention to life sentences.
RigelDog–I agree about the seemingly arbitrary quality of death sentences–that was one of the reasons for the Furman ruling in the first place. I think capital punishment should be reserved for very special cases, and of course political murderers such as Saddam, Hitler, terrorists, and that sort of thing, which require a different and more intense response (and, as another commenter pointed out, ordinarily involve far less chance of mistaken identity).
I agree with the general sense here – that the theoretical justification for abolishing the death penalty is weak, but that its abuse is so tragic that we should be enormously cautious.
But stumbley hits on the important practical point. As with any antisocial act, catching people frequently is the more certain deterrent (even if the punishment is lesser). As we do not have that luxury of constant success catching criminals, we are driven to the less-effective solution of harsher punishment.
Europe has not abolished the death penalty outright. It remains on the book for crimes against humanity – which Saddam would have been found guilty of if the Americano-shiite coalition had not found it more expedient to expedite him to spite the sunnis on their equivalent to Easter.
The fact that crimes against humanity are still punishable by death the world around, of course, is one of the reasons why the U.S. has been trying to kill the International War Crimes Tribunals. But lo and behold, it turns out that the IWCT is showing that they actually know how to dispense justice. So now, it is clear that sometime the Americans will sign up for a lesson in democracy with consequences.
For things as important and sacred as a person’s life, sometimes even the popular opinion can be disturbingly offtrack. I am pro-democracy (duh), but there are some things many in the general populus cannot grasp the severity of — so those of a ‘higher’ enlightenment must make the decision. For example, in post-WWI Germany, most Germans were fine with a dictator taking over and fantasizing about how that person could make their many problems less. If there was someone who would have taken power and not chose the popular opinion path of the German people, would that be better than a person taking power, following the popular opinion, and wreaking havoc, murdering millions, and starting wars?
But lo and behold, it turns out that the IWCT is showing that they actually know how to dispense justice.
They didn’t dispense any justice to anybody.
Yep, typical European organization, all sound and fury signifying nothing.
Europe, excepting France, sucked off the American nipple during the entire Cold War. If we had told them to pay for it themselves, they would have rolled over on their backs and shown their bellies to the Soviets like a submissive dog.
Yes, I have much respect for Europe.
If it is true that the “Elite” are the control freaks that you say they are then you can be sure that they would control the well regulated militias as well as everything else.
So the Elite believes that when they are in power as civilians, that civilians should not decide what to do with the military?
Of course they wish for military control, like Al Sadr. But only the most loyal the and most patriotic of folks actually understand how to defend in a military or civilian sense. The aristocrats can only understand how to kill and exploit.
The deterence argument is again an example of why the Left seeks to engineer the Pavlovian response system out of humanity, and replace it with a Socialist system or some other system that they and they alone will control. It doesn’t work, Neo. They do not have the genetic engineering technology to pull it off. And even if they did… well that would be even worse now wouldn’t it.
The Pavlovian system of doing what you are rewarded to do and avoiding what you are punished for doing, has always been with humans. The Left cannot change that, and even if they could, they should not.
Xrlq | Homepage | 02.02.07 – 6:44 pm | #
Interesting logic, X. Something for Neo to ponder. Because certainly many folks on the Left, former or active, seem to have this belief that life imprisonment is a worst punishment while at the same time supporting life. But the punishment should fit the crime, that is the principle I go by.
No, I can’t prove this, but it’s common sense.
Promethea | 02.02.07 – 7:24 pm | #
Many folks like Promethea feel that it is justice, the DP, but cannot explain why. There are two models to explain why the DP is justice.
The first model is the Meta-Golden Rule. In which justice is decided not by us, not by the victims, or the courts, or even the jury. The Meta-Golden Rule makes it so that the criminals themselves decide what punishment they deserve, by the actions that they have committed. If they have held many people under their power, and have shown in mercy to those, then the criminal has decided that this is how superior people should treat those who are inferior in power. We did not decide. They did. We are just carrying out their wishes. We did not make them kill or rape. We are just following the rule of law.
However, if a criminal has shown mercy to his victims, in some way or another (they call it extenuating circumstances) then certainly mercy should be shown by the state, which is now more powerful than the criminal because the criminal is now caught. Hostage situations in which the assailant lets the hostage go freely.. certainly that is a good thing.
The second model is one of pragmatism. Meaning, you must kill these sadists and murderers because if they get out and kill again… who is to blame. Who will be execute and who will take responsibility for such? The lawyers? No. The judges? No. The jury? No. The prison wardens? Not reall
y. You see, no body will take responsibility, since it is everybody’s responsibility. Which is why the state, which represents everybody, should execute the criminals. Because No One Individual will take responsibility for allowing evil loose. No justice will occur because no one will be responsible. So if nobody is responsible, then the criminal must be responsible. And if you don’t punish the criminal, then who is left to punish, the judges? The lawyers? you cannot punish them. The position of a judge was designed to separate them from the passions of the common folks, for good or ill.
If judges were executed for allowing murderers and child rapists loose to kill and hurt again… then that would be a kind of justice. Small, but at least it will be there. But right now, with the system we have? We must kill the criminals, otherwise they will kill again and justice will not only be delayed, but will be mocked and degraded.
Those are the two models, in my view, to justify why the DP, as viewed by folks like Promethea and I, is justice.
They did finally give him his wish.
Ariel | 02.02.07 – 8:39 pm | #
An interesting alternative argument for the DP. So many died because the criminal obviously wasn’t just going to sit around in life without causing his displeasure to be known.
Go back and actually read it.
neo-neocon | Homepage | 02.02.07 – 9:01 pm | #
I said this here before, Neo. Which was that semi-literacy and illiteracy are indeed the bane of the existence of humanity.
You’re right, Michael, maybe we got the wrong “Saddam.” There might be a million of them in Iraq.
holmes | 02.03.07 – 12:31 am | #
I don’t think that was the point MIke was making, but I might be wrong.
Sure, there are cases like Fritz and Williamson, but they weren’t executed, were they?
With technology these days, certainty, while never 100%, is certainly getting near that point. If there weren’t a load of “I Love Tookie” gang groupies around, we could be more lenient. But we know that any show of weakness, will be used to undermine the case against the guilty. We Know This.
Basically, I think that it takes up too much of our resources.
You are damn straight it takes up too much of our resources. That is what the “I Love Tookie” folks wanted and it is what they fought for. We are not just fighting to put the guilty to Death, we are fighting the “I Love Tookie” groupies at the same time. If only if it was as simple as figuring out the question of DP or no DP.
an inordinate amount of court time that could be devoted to trying cases to begin with.
We all know the time that the ACLU devotes to certain cases, and we all know the reasons. Even if some of us won’t admit it, or will say they are good reasons.
The system of advocacy will only work if the resources are equal on both sides. If one side or the other gets “tired”, we have a miscarriage of justice, just by defin
ition.
As we do not have that luxury of constant success catching criminals, we are driven to the less-effective solution of harsher punishment.
Assistant Village Idiot | Homepage | 02.03.07 – 9:49 pm | #
We do catch them. It is just that it is catch and release. Death and taxes are perhaps the only things of certainty in this existence.
I’m not sure what Neo means by arbitrary. But certainly prosecutors have to work within the confines of the rules and the system. So they know that unless their case is pretty good (and this is subjective), it will be much harder to go for a death penalty. More resources, again. Since states require a unanimous vote by the jury for death. Is that arbitrary? It is just the system. Bad or good. Does twelve jurors arbitrarily decide someone should go to death? No. They might be wrong, but they don’t do it arbitrarily. Not often in today’s world anyways.
And then there is the rather weird incidence of the Double Jeopardy. Where folks like OJ can never be tried again. But those who get death get endless appeals… Does that seem like justice to you. Where not only do prosecutors have the burden of proof, but they also have the burden of the appeal system. There are no appeals for those who were declared innocent, but there are appeals for those declared guilty, more if DP. We know the system is skewed. And that it directly contradicts the spiritual principle of the advocacy system, where says that if both sides have equal representation, power, and resources, the truth between the two sides will come out in the fight. More likely to come out that is than arbitrary decisions.
Certainly the appeals system does its job as it was designed to. Which is not to protect the community from criminals, but to curtail government power.
As we see with the Knifon prosecutor, lawyers are inherently a tricky proposition, and one who abuses the power of their rank and position, can do much harm.
Does the appeal system reduce the incidence of bad cases? Most probably yes. But as we all know (S Border). Judges and lawyers have found many loopholes in how to skew results their way. Their way being the way of releasing criminals that is.
clearthought: No, actually, Hitler did not come to power because the majority of Germans supported him or voted for him. That’s a common misconception. He actually came to power because of a backroom deal between himself and those who were already in charge, who thought they could contain and handle him. Hubris on their part–a hubris for which millions paid with their lives.
See this.
That executions take so long and cost so much is a function of the leeway given to opponents of the penalty, who raise objection after objection for years on end. They, and the judges who give them the leeway, are the cause of the cost and delay.
As to fear of executing the innocent: do we fail to imprison thieves because we fear imprisoning the innocent? Al Gore himself said in a presidential debate that the possiblity of executing an innocent is something we have to live with. Don’t give me this “life is sacred” or “different” argument, unless you want to admit that it is religiously based hokum. We all die.
Furman v. Georgia resulted in the commutation of a murder’s sentence in Texas. A judge later ordered release of prisoners by reason of prison overcrowding and put Kenneth Allen McDuff on the street, where he became once again a serial murderer and torturer. All of you who say the penalty is no deterrent should cut the mendacity. Unlike claims that the innocent MIGHT be executed, McDuff did kill multiple times because his life was spared.
It is udoubtedly buried somewhere in the calculating minds of the European elites that they wouldn’t want their necks stretched if their time should ever come. Won’t help.
Billy Shakes sagely pointed out that mercy to the guilty is cruelty to the innocent. Me, I just can’t be as cruel as a Euroweenie.
As a group, convicted murderers have a certainty of killing X number of more people, even while in jail. That would be guards and other inmates, citizens if they escape, not to mention, if connected, ordering wet work done outside. Tookie Williams was accused of having done the latter.
Therefore, letting them live means accepting the X number of additional deaths, few or none of whom are actually convicted murderers, and some of whom have nothing to do with crime.
This is easy. The victims, not being known in advance, have no names, no faces, and no families. Easy enough to pitch them over the side to make ourselves feel better.
Of course, actual victims of murder don’t get much sympathetic ink, either, in comparison to the murderer.
Must read by Shrink Neo
During the 60s and 70s one of the great divides between Liberals and Conservatives involved the question of criminal rights. Although there was broad agreement, and our system of jurisprudence explicitly supported the idea, that it is better to let 10 guilty men go free than to imprison one innocent man, great battles took place over where to draw an acceptable demarcation. The far left insisted that any, even the most minimal and non-contributory, infraction by the state was enough to invalidate the entire process. One (probably unintentional) effect of this approach, was to create barriers to the community’s ability to defend itself against human predators.
One by-product of such an approach was seen in the 1980s when parts of New York City had become uninhabitable war zones and all of New York City had deteriorated into a terrorized silence through the application of such thinking. For those who are unaware, Rudy Giuliani was vilified specifically for attacking this dysfunctional approach to crime.
The exemplar of such a liberal approach to crime was and is the ACLU, which has taken more and more of an adversarial position against the government since 9/11 and has sought to extend their writ to the Non-American Civil Liberties Union.
Wittingly, or unwittingly, the effort to extend just such an approach to our conduct of the war on terror is part of a larger attempt to delegitimize the concept of the right to self-defense that is being increasingly incorporated into the thinking of the Western cultural elites; the prime targets of such delegitimization are America and our ally, Israel.
There’s another argument for the death penalty – as a prosecutorial/negotiating tool.
Saddam probably thought he could brazen his way out of any dilemma, and hence refused the pre-war ultimatum to leave Iraq with an offer of safe passage. If at the time he’d known that he’d be hanged if he were caught, he likely would have followed in the footsteps of, e.g., the Shah, Idi Amin, Aristide & Co. and accepted exile, saving many others’ lives in so doing.
Faced with the Ceauceascu plan, or the Idi Amin plan, the decision would be easy.
(In similar fashion (the prosecutor above can comment on this), on the domestic front, I would expect the possibility of the death penalty would set tongues to wagging pretty quickly, thereby helping to clear cases.)
Negotiating with nasty regimes (e.g., Iran) could be a lot more effective if the leaders realize that they, personally, have skin in the game. The impact of sanctions can be pushed off onto hoi polloi, the impact of a noose cannot.