It is a detestable thing to order the killing of another person. It is so detestable that in many countries, and in more than thirty American States, such killings are punishable by extreme jail terms or death.
For example, in November 2011, James Fayed was sentenced to death in Los Angeles for the contract killing of his estranged wife, while in April 2012, a Texan woman named Vanessa Cameron received a 70 year jail term for arranging the contract death of her young son’s father. The presiding judges called Cameron “cold-blooded”, and Fayed “one cold, calculating human being.” It is to be hoped that the judge who spoke these words about Fayed was aware of the irony in her authorising his cold-blooded and calculated killing. She, no doubt, would defend her comments on the grounds that she, like the jury, was merely upholding the legal will of the people.
Recent statistics from the U.S. and Britain suggest that around two-thirds of citizens are supportive of the death penalty being applied to certain types of crime. Proponents of capital punishment cite these polls as ammunition for their side of the debate: if it is the will of the people, then surely it is prescribed justice. This argument is wrong on many levels, but two will suffice here. To begin with, the manner in which polls like this are conducted is seriously flawed. Polls conducted around the time of a sensational crime typically result in higher percentages of death penalty support, while polls that also offer respondents the option of life without parole typically yield much lower numbers. The will of the people is not absolute; it is circumstantial.
Secondly, and more crucially, history teaches that it is a mistake to consider a thing ‘right’ simply because the majority think it is so. Common sense suggests this too: otherwise, how can the putting to death of a human being, either by lethal injection or at the stake, be right at one time and wrong at another? When all the facts and arguments are set aside, the question of whether we should permit social contract killings is resolved through the caprices of human opinion.
There are vagaries in the way that the death penalty is applied too. There are 12,000-15,000 murders annually in the U.S. and around fifty executions. How does one person receive a death warrant, while hundreds of others do not? Although there is evidence to suggest that poor, non-white males are, pro rata, more likely to be executed, the real answer may be even more straightforward, and more appalling, than that. According to David Dow, a Texan lawyer and author who represents death-row inmates, the entire system is a lottery. Prejudice, politicking and bad legal strategy is often what condemns, rather than any notions of rightness or justice. For readers who would like to know more about the scattershot American approach to capital punishment, Dow’s book, “Killing Time” (2010) is heartily recommended. (The book is also known as “Autobiography of an Execution”.)
It is difficult to see how such a random application of lethal punishment can act as a deterrent to serious crime. Although all arguments about the deterrent effect of capital punishment are essentially specious as there are so many other mitigating factors, the irrationality with which it is applied makes the deterrent factor a moot point. If it is to be truly effective, might it not be more practical to exercise the will of the people at every opportunity (like China), or in public (like Iran or Saudi Arabia)?
Arguments about the inevitability of executing innocents, or about the cost of capital cases, try to address issues to do with the practicalities of capital punishment, rather than its essential ‘rightness’. Even if it could be shown that it was impossible to kill the wrong person, or that executions could be conducted free of charge, the killing of another person, even of the lowest sort, would not be right. Public retribution is not justice. It is not restorative, nor is it utilitarian. It does not elevate the human spirit. It is a scar on what civilization truly means.