Posted on 02/14/2007 10:19:32 AM PST by jsmith1942
>>I wouldn't want to be a victim of that sort of "accident".<<
I used to be in a prison ministry band. I've been to all sorts of prisons. If I was ever looking at a trial that could end in me spending ANY time in prison (whether I did the crime or not), unless I was visited by an angel in my jail cell as this guy was, as soon as I got out on bail I would be headed straight out of the country, never to be seen again.
I would avoid prison at all costs and I have NO resect for the courts.
Agreed, that could be argued as well, however, a longer prison sentence doesn't violate the inherent dignity of a human being in the same way killing him does. There's a big difference between being alive and being dead, and that's where the Church (at least) draws the line in its teaching.
Thanks for the x-link.
As I pointed out on the other thread, I have a problem with the whole concept of prison as it is known today. I don't think it is effective either as a means of punishment or as a way to safeguard the public from criminals. I would prefer to see a simple three-tiered system of criminal punishment: confinement (under Spartan conditions -- say an outdoor fenced pen behind the local courthouse) for misdemeanor crimes, corporal punishment (caning) for non-violent felony crimes, and hanging for crimes of violence. Hanging would be used only in cases where a plea of "guilty" is entered by the accused; those claiming innocence would be given a commuted sentence (up to life) without possibility of parole, to be served in a prison camp run under military discipline.
Ideally, we should have a Coventry -- an area where the law does not apply -- in every state. This area would have fenced and guarded borders, but the area within those borders would be terra nullis, no man's land, a place without any law or legal government at all. Those who choose to live without the law would be sent to Coventry, where no law exists, there to survive as best they can.
The Church has never held that capital punishment, in itself, violates the inherent dignity of a human being.
America desperately needs to kick its killing habit, in all its various forms. This country will never be healthy until we firmly embrace life. Whether it's criminals, the unborn, the terminally ill or anyone else whom we deem unworthy of life or a danger or inconvenience.
Justice will be administered to all, one day, but it won't be here and now.
No one is saying that we should execute anyone who might commit a murder. No one is arguing that there is some perfect prediction system where we can take out all potential murderers. All the deacon was pointing out is that known murderers later killed others who might be alive if the murderers had been executed. We don't need to have perfect predictive capabilities. None exist in any case. One can still reasonably argue that capital punishment could have saved the lives of others who were not capital offenders.
Of course not. But the law itself begins with an assumption of innocence and prevents you from going out and administering that justice, yourself. The system is designed to deliver not only a truthful verdict, but a fair sentence. In the case of your hypothetically murdered family members, unfortunately, we have a system that has gotten to the point where a guilty person may or may not pay the price for the crime committed against you. If an innocent person is executed for these murders, how does that give you justice? How magnified would your sorrow be if, down the road, you discovered that you helped put an innocent man to death as a means of getting justice for your departed?
And, of course, the real deterrent effect to that kind of crime isn't an impersonal death penalty carried out by the state years later, but a highly personal and immediate death penalty carried out during the crime by a random gun-carrying citizen who gets caught in the crossfire.
When the state stopped trusting the armed citizen and started denigrating his role in crime prevention, it led directly to all of these other problems.
"This is the context in which to place the problem of the death penalty. On this matter there is a growing tendency, both in the Church and in civil society, to demand that it be applied in a very limited way or even that it be abolished completely. The problem must be viewed in the context of a system of penal justice ever more in line with human dignity and thus, in the end, with God's plan for man and society. The primary purpose of the punishment which society inflicts is "to redress the disorder caused by the offence."(46) Public authority must redress the violation of personal and social rights by imposing on the offender an adequate punishment for the crime, as a condition for the offender to regain the exercise of his or her freedom. In this way authority also fulfills the purpose of defending public order and ensuring people's safety, while at the same time offering the offender an incentive and help to change his or her behaviour and be rehabilitated.(47)
It is clear that, for these purposes to be achieved, the nature and extent of the punishment must be carefully evaluated and decided upon, and ought not go to the extreme of executing the offender except in cases of absolute necessity: in other words, when it would not be possible otherwise to defend society. Today however, as a result of steady improvements in the organization of the penal system, such cases are very rare, if not practically non-existent.
In any event, the principle set forth in the new Catechism of the Catholic Church remains valid: 'If bloodless means are sufficient to defend human lives against an aggressor and to protect public order and the safety of persons, public authority must limit itself to such means, because they better correspond to the concrete conditions of the common good and are more in conformity to the dignity of the human person.'"
(46) Catechism of the Catholic Church, No. 2266
(47) Cf. ibid.
I said that guilt must be proven beyond doubt, in both of my posts. The argument about the innocent being executed doesn't hold water after that.
Precisely.
If there are cases where capital punishment is necessary then, by definition, it cannot be inherently violative of human dignity.
Something that is morally necessary cannot be inherently immoral.
I would reserve execution to those who would plead guilty only.
If he hadn't been on death row, would he ever have been exonerated? Life sentences don't inspire/demand as much attention.
If so, no one would be executed. Is that what you meant?
No one pleads guilty now.
Damn straight.
Agreed. Well put.
......and he would still be in prison, serving a life term, a fate (according to the liberals) worse than death.
-- However, I've come to the realization that a nation as morally and politically fouled-up as ours -- a nation that can produce an OJ jury, a Clinton presidency, and Roe v. Wade -- has no business even putting people in jail, let alone executing them. --
OJ was set free. Did you clap when the verdict was announced?
--States such as California (which implements the death penalty) are seeing a horrendous uptick in violent crime between gangs (and sometimes involving innocent bystanders) in the L.A. area.--
Care to back that up with some data?
The problem is, no statistical movement can settle the case either way. We always have to scan a whole range of arguments and data when trying to come to a conclusion about the death penalty.
To definitively prove that the DP deters/doesn't deter murders, we would have to set up parallel universes where all conditions are the same except for the death penalty. You note above that California has the death penalty, but murders are increasing. But the question is, would they have increased more if the death penalty were not in force?
Let's look at it from the other side: in my state, Michigan, we don't have the death penalty. Let's say we institute it and murders drop 15%. Ishmac rejoices and says,"You see, I'm right!" But I would be dumb to claim this as definitive proof because murders may have dropped off for some other reason (eg, all the murderous types left MI because the economy here is tanking and there are fewer people here to rob, beat or kill). Maybe they all move to warmer climes like CA,or better hunting grounds like Chicago, where the death penalty deters some from committing capital crimes--we just don't know. We would have to run our parallel universes and see whether the decrease/increase would have been greater/lesser without the death penalty. So a mere increase or decrease in one direction won't make the case for either one of us, even if the stats seem straightforward.
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