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(2/5/2007)

Why the Death Penalty is Pro Life and Pro Justice

By Bob Ellis

Editor

Two bills were introduced in the South Dakota legislature on Jan. 25 to abolish the death penalty in South Dakota. Both SB 161 and HB 1195 are simple and strike the word "death" from the maximum penalty for a Class A felony, leaving the maximum punishment as "life imprisonment."

While the bills are not expected to succeed (indeed, HB 1195 was killed in committee Friday), since a KELO poll conducted in Nov. 2006 indicated 68% of South Dakotans support the death penalty, the issue remains important enough to warrant serious examination.

Of the 102 convicted murderers in the state penitentiary, only four are on death row. Two of them are Elijah Page and Briley Piper, who committed the savage and prolonged murder of their "friend" Chester Allan Poage near Spearfish in 2000. The third is Donald Moeller, who abducted, raped and killed nine-year-old Becky O'Connell 17 years ago. The fourth is Charles Rhines who murdered Donnivan Schaeffer during a doughnut shop robbery some 15 years ago.

Death penalty opponents often argue that it has limited deterrent value. However, a 1999 study conducted at Emory and Clemson Universities found that each execution results in an average of 18 fewer murders. The DPINFO website cites another 2003 University of Colorado study found that the death penalty reduced homicides by five to six victims, but for every three additional pardons or commutations, 1-1.5 additional murders result.

It's also interesting that within a few years of the drop in executions after World War II the murder rate began an unprecedented and steep climb. What's more, it was consistently climbing each year until the death penalty was reinstituted in the United States in 1976.

Of course, the death penalty is robbed of much of it's deterrent effect because it is so seldom administered. South Dakota has 102 convicted murderers in prison, but only four on death row, which means the death penalty was administered in less than 4% of murder convictions.

When you further consider that the U.S. average time from sentence to execution is 12 years, far removing the consequence from the action, it's a wonder any deterrent value remains at all. For those four killers on death row in South Dakota, it’s been an average of 11 years since they murdered their victims. Yet the death penalty still manages to provide deterrence. Why? Because when administered, the death penalty requires the ultimate price in recompense for the life taken. Despite the low odds of actually getting the punishment deserved, that still motivates some people not to take a life.

Life imprisonment is a poor alternative to execution. Beside the fact that it is a disproportionate punishment for the wrongful taking of a human life (more on that shortly), prisoners sometimes escape, putting the public at further risk. Also, prisoners who have demonstrated a disregard for human life in the past endanger the corrections officers who guard them, and other less violent prisoners; it is not uncommon for violent prisoners to rack up an additional murder or two while in prison. Finally, it is both practically and morally senseless to spend our tax dollars on the food, clothing and well-being of someone who has demonstrated their hostility toward innocent human life. A speedy execution would be much less costly than 25-50 years in prison.

There is not a single documented case of an innocent person being executed, and with the advent of DNA testing, the possibility of executing an innocent person is even less. While some death penalty opponents have compiled lists of supposedly "innocent" people who have been on death row and later released, most of these are easily dismissed. Some were removed from death row because of "due process" errors or other technicalities, and others because of evidence that, while not proving actual innocence, lowered the threshold below our legal requirement of guilt "beyond a reasonable doubt." In other words, just because the evidence against them doesn't reach the level of indicating guilt beyond a reasonable doubt, doesn't mean they are actually innocent of the crime.

Some well-meaning people also argue that capital punishment is inconsistent with a pro-life philosophy. While this error is understandable on the surface, the death penalty is actually 100% consistent with a pro-life position.

First and foremost, there is absolutely no conflict or inconsistency between supporting the death penalty and opposing abortion.  Abortion ends the life of an innocent unborn human being--in fact, the unborn are the most innocent among us, having committed no sins or crimes.  The death penalty is the execution of justice by the state upon someone who has committed the most terrible crime known to humanity.  Just to seriously compare the two is an insult to life, justice and innocence. 

To say that taking away the life of the murderer who took someone else's life means we don't value human life would be like saying that since married prisoners can't fulfill their obligations as husband or wife means we don't value marriage. It would be like saying that since we only allow prisoners to have a few possessions and we tightly regulate their lives 24 hours a day means we don't value personal freedom. These arguments would be absurd, but it is no less absurd when applied to the death penalty. They are being punished because they broke the law, what should be our highest law. They forfeited their rights, and they forfeited their freedoms. Murderers have shown such casual disregard for the sacredness and irreplacability of a human life that they must be removed from life so that (a) they and everyone else understands the utter intolerance we have for the wrongful taking of human life, and (b) we counter the murderer's statement that the victim's life lacked worth with a statement that no, it had so much worth that the wrongful taking of it demands the forfeiture of the perpetrator's own life.

If we place the value on human life that we should, we recognize that the wrongful taking of human life should demand a penalty higher than any other crime. After all, you can take a lot of things away from a person, but if you take away their life, you have taken absolutely everything from them. True justice involves an attempt to make restitution, to "balance the books." There is no way the murderer can make restitution because no human being can raise the dead or give life back to the dead; even if the family is willing to forgive and forget, the party who was actually wronged remains dead and uncompensated for the life that was stolen from them. The value of their stolen years, their stolen experiences, is immeasurable and incalculable. The closest the murderer can come is to give up his own life.  Anything less than the death penalty sends the message that the murderer's life is more valuable than that of his victim.

Capital punishment is also completely in harmony with the Bible. The oft mis-cited Sixth Commandment actually condemns "murder," not "killing" in the original language, and there is an important distinction. Another passage dealing with the woman caught in adultery speaks to the duplicity and hypocrisy of those who were out to get Jesus. In fact, Jesus seems to have directly affirmed the death penalty when he said, “all who draw the sword will die by the sword.” Jesus' apostle Paul also said that the government “does not bear the sword for nothing,” telling us that the government has a role in punishing the wrongdoer.

Most importantly from a biblical perspective, God (Jesus and God are one) told Noah in Genesis 9, “Whoever sheds the blood of man, by man shall his blood be shed; for in the image of God has God made man.” This edict was issued long before the Law of Moses, has no connection to it, and was in no way affected by the New Covenant brought by Jesus. It applies to all of humanity for all time, and God has never rescinded it.  

What's more, I think the case could be made that God sent the global Flood upon the earth in the first place largely in part because of the murderousness of men before the Flood.  Notice that in Genesis 6, the reason God gives for the Flood: "Now the earth was corrupt in God's sight and was full of violence....So God said to Noah, "I am going to put an end to all people, for the earth is filled with violence because of them."   When you consider this in tandem with God's edict in Genesis 9 after the Flood, as humanity started its new beginning, it seems highly likely to me that the cause of the Flood, the Flood itself, and the edict after the Flood are related.

There is no compelling reason to abolish the death penalty, but there are many to keep it around, and even step up and expedite its use. It tells those tempted to murder that they will pay the ultimate price for their crime.  It tells society that murder is wrong and it will not be tolerated. It is the best we can do in an imperfect world to balance the scales of justice.  It tells the loved ones of the victim that their loved ones are valued, and society is committed to justice. And if you're a Bible-believer, it's what the Author of all human life told us to do.

In considering the death penalty, we should ask ourselves why our society spends so much time and energy on shielding lawbreakers from the rightful consequences of their actions, while victims and their families get the crumbs that inadvertently fall from the table of justice.