WASHINGTON—The unseemly love affair of some American politicians with the death penalty is bad for justice and bad for our country’s standing in the world. It inflicts a wholly unnecessary moral stain on a nation that rightly preaches the rule of law to everyone else.
Even more remarkable is the indifference that five justices of the Supreme Court have shown to such considerations.
And then there is Gov. Rick Perry of Texas, who insisted upon pushing ahead with the execution of Humberto Leal, a Mexican national convicted of the rape and killing of a teenager. Even former President George W. Bush—who presided over 152 executions as Perry’s predecessor—had qualms about the case. Bush hasn’t gone soft. He’s legitimately worried about the costs of the United States’ thumbing its nose at the government of Mexico and the world.
President Obama, the International Court of Justice and the Mexican government all wanted a stay of execution. But Perry’s press secretary was unapologetic. “Texas,” said Katherine Cesinger, “is not bound by a foreign court’s ruling.”
Imagine if an American life was at stake and a press secretary said that Iran—or Russia or Saudi Arabia or China—did not feel “bound by a foreign court’s ruling.”
Let’s be clear: This case involved a brutal crime, and Leal himself seemed to confess his guilt just before he died. “I take full blame for everything,” he said. “I am sorry for what I did.”
The Associated Press’ summary of the charges against Leal makes plain the sheer evil of the crime. It involved “the 1994 murder of 16-year-old Adria Sauceda, whose brutalized nude body was found hours after he left a San Antonio street party with her. She was bludgeoned with a chunk of asphalt.”
No one disputes that Leal deserved to be punished. And while I am strongly opposed to the death penalty, I would stipulate that if a state chooses to have one, this is the sort of crime for which it was intended.
But the episode dramatizes the way in which these inevitably politicized death penalty cases—Perry is mulling a Republican presidential candidacy—seem to harden us and rob us of our reason.
The International Court of Justice ruled that 51 Mexican-born inmates nationwide, including Leal, were entitled to new hearings in American courts to determine if their consular rights were violated. President Bush accepted the decision, but the Supreme Court overruled him in 2005.
So Sen. Pat Leahy, the chairman of the Judiciary Committee, has been pushing—so far unsuccessfully—to change American law to comply with the Vienna Convention on Consular Relations. He argues that “thousands of Americans are detained abroad while they study, travel, work, and serve in the military” and need access to consular officials who can “monitor their treatment, help them obtain legal assistance, and connect them to family back home.”
The Vienna Convention, which the United States agreed to, protects such rights, Leahy noted when he reintroduced his bill last month. “But it only functions effectively if every country meets its obligations under the treaty—including the United States.”
The four more liberal justices on the Supreme Court thought that little would be lost by delaying the execution. Writing for the dissenters, Justice Stephen Breyer sensibly argued that “it is difficult to see how the state’s interest in the immediate execution of an individual convicted of capital murder 16 years ago can outweigh the considerations that support additional delay, perhaps only until the end of the summer.”
But the five-justice conservative majority let the execution go forward on Thursday. They dismissed the president’s worries about the impact of the execution abroad as “free-ranging assertions of foreign policy consequences” that were “unaccompanied by a persuasive legal claim.” It’s disconcerting that a majority of our Supreme Court seems positively impatient just to get on with these executions.
Those of us who oppose the death penalty or think it’s imposed too frequently find ourselves interceding in cases involving truly terrible crimes that deserve severe punishment. But this is not about absolving criminals. It’s about our nation’s core values and how the rest of the world sees us. In this instance, it’s also about protecting the rights of Americans overseas.
When it comes to capital punishment, can’t we find it in ourselves as a nation to let our reason check our passions, even when those passions are entirely understandable?
E.J. Dionne’s email address is ejdionne(at)washpost.com.
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The other interesting thing is that many supporters of the death penalty are vocally opposed to abortion. There is an old line that says ‘many christians believe that life starts at conception and ends with birth.’
There is no denying that the family of a murder victim feels emotions that may include revenge and wanting the person dead that killed their family member. However, to translate that into a community value is a big jump. And not necessarily one that is to the community’s benefit.
I just think of all the people that are needlessly put into the death deciding process, from the jurors, to the judge, to the lawyers, to the jail guards, to the families of both the killer and victim. It creates more hate and violence then it prevents. This doesn’t include all the innocent people that have been put to death.
In Europe, where there is no death penalty, they have a lower murder rate then here in the US.
Of course, many people feel that the killing of Bin Laden was justified. I’m not one of those people. True justice would have been much better served by having him tried. But of course, that couldn’t guarantee the outcome that our warmongers wanted.
The best non-ethical argument against the death penalty has been that related to the extreme costs involved. Life terms actually work out to be less expensive.
What is lacking is a new “Devils Island” where evil miscreants can be segregated and prevented from harming society. Our prisons have become merely training grounds for future crimes.
Maybe one-way tickets to Mars will be available some day - carry-on oxygen optional.
By Peter Hockley, July 12, 2011 at 5:37 am Link to this comment
(Unregistered commenter)
If killing some one is wrong, it is wrong in all cases.
It is a moral absolute.
I would personally find it more punishing to bang
someone up for life, rather than legally murdering
them.
By Rodney, July 12, 2011 at 1:58 am Link to this comment
(Unregistered commenter)
The death penalty is routinely used to make political careers. Especially in the South where corrupt police and juries sent innocent black men to their death, and freed guilty white men. Made those Govornors seem tough on crime on the right kind of criminal. Remember the Bush boys especially George were frying people like chickens in Texas and Florida. Helped them steal I mean win many elections. In the South they refer to it as states rights. Sort of like that slavery thing.Get accused in the South they kill you whether you did it or not. Unless you are Casey Anthony. I wonder if she would have gotten off if she were a black man?
“It inflicts a wholly unnecessary moral stain on a nation that rightly preaches the rule of law to everyone else.”
How does this nation have an ounce of credibility “RIGHTLY” preaching anything regarding the rule of law? Two words: indefinite detention.
We lead the industrialized world in income disparity and percentage of citizens incarcerated, and Mr. Dionne thinks we have a leg to stand on as we preach??
It is more accurate to refer to the death penalty as government-sanctioned
murder. These valid foreign policy points aside, there is also no evidence to
suggest that it is a deterrent of any kind and it ends up costing the taxpayers (in
aggregate) more in judicial proceedings than it would cost to house a convict in
prison for life. If one innocent man or woman is murdered by the government as a
result of this craven, morally repugnant institution (and plenty have been), what
right does our government have to exist?
Thanks, Mr. Dionne. I have never been so ashamed of our governor than when he did not either give this man a new trial or at least allow him to see a Mexican diplomatic official prior to his execution. When you pull all of the silly, non-factual arguments pro-death people raise out from under them they get all huffy and say, “At least he won’t kill again.” This is capitulation to the law of the old desert warlord tribes of the O.T., “an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.” Christians are supposed to forgive. Not that I can see. Jesus don’t like killin’ no matter what the reason is.
An absurd proposition (i.e., that the death penalty is a valid punishment) can only be maintained if absurd methods are used to prop it up. One absurd expedient is that all members of the jury pool who are categorically opposed to capital punishment (such as Roman Catholics) must be excluded from sitting as jurors in death cases. This means that death sentences do not accurately reflect the values of the community as a whole, which is absurd. Another absurdity is that insane prisoners must be forcibly medicated to restore their sanity so that they can understand the actualities of their execution by the state. This means that the delusional are forced into an orientation sufficient to ensure that they die frightened; and that’s absurd.
Capital punishment is too flawed. Dump it!
Our Constitution implies that ratified treaties have the force of Constitutional Law, that they are, by definition, Constitutional, and with good reason: just like our national debt, it is the full faith and DIPLOMATIC credit of the nation than should not and cannot be defaulted on due to DISASTROUS consequences.
The USSC, Rick Perry and the Texas lege has just forced us to renege on our ratified treaty obligations.
We love the death penalty. It appeals to our warped
Judeo/Christian sense of justice. Never mind the cases
of innocent prisoners executed; never mind the racist
application of the executions; never mind that
politicians use the death penalty as a wedge issue to
show their constituents that they are tough on crime.
Our Supreme Court is dominated by murderers and
hypocrites; unfeeling automatons bound by ideology and
supposed legal scholarship yet wanting in any sense of
humanity. Those Justices are representative of a people
lacking in empathy and reason.
By Stan Moody, July 11, 2011 at 4:29 am Link to this comment
(Unregistered commenter)
I find myself astounded at the entrenched parochialism
of right wing politicos…America cannot seem to shake
its wild west ethos…We will be drawing against each
other and locking each other up long after China
reaches the pinnacle of economic power…
Terracide and the Terrarists: Destroying the Planet for Record Profits
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By culheath, July 13, 2011 at 5:16 am Link to this comment
I have a button I wear that reads:
“Why do we kill people who kill people
to show that killing people is wrong.”
As was mentioned by an earlier poster, everything about capital punishment is absurd.
Report thisBy Not One More!, July 12, 2011 at 10:57 am Link to this comment
The irony. Killing for justice.
The other interesting thing is that many supporters of the death penalty are vocally opposed to abortion. There is an old line that says ‘many christians believe that life starts at conception and ends with birth.’
There is no denying that the family of a murder victim feels emotions that may include revenge and wanting the person dead that killed their family member. However, to translate that into a community value is a big jump. And not necessarily one that is to the community’s benefit.
I just think of all the people that are needlessly put into the death deciding process, from the jurors, to the judge, to the lawyers, to the jail guards, to the families of both the killer and victim. It creates more hate and violence then it prevents. This doesn’t include all the innocent people that have been put to death.
In Europe, where there is no death penalty, they have a lower murder rate then here in the US.
Of course, many people feel that the killing of Bin Laden was justified. I’m not one of those people. True justice would have been much better served by having him tried. But of course, that couldn’t guarantee the outcome that our warmongers wanted.
Report thisBy Hulk2008, July 12, 2011 at 6:55 am Link to this comment
The best non-ethical argument against the death penalty has been that related to the extreme costs involved. Life terms actually work out to be less expensive.
What is lacking is a new “Devils Island” where evil miscreants can be segregated and prevented from harming society. Our prisons have become merely training grounds for future crimes.
Maybe one-way tickets to Mars will be available some day - carry-on oxygen optional.
Report thisBy Peter Hockley, July 12, 2011 at 5:37 am Link to this comment
(Unregistered commenter)
If killing some one is wrong, it is wrong in all cases.
Report thisIt is a moral absolute.
I would personally find it more punishing to bang
someone up for life, rather than legally murdering
them.
By Rodney, July 12, 2011 at 1:58 am Link to this comment
(Unregistered commenter)
The death penalty is routinely used to make political careers. Especially in the South where corrupt police and juries sent innocent black men to their death, and freed guilty white men. Made those Govornors seem tough on crime on the right kind of criminal. Remember the Bush boys especially George were frying people like chickens in Texas and Florida. Helped them steal I mean win many elections. In the South they refer to it as states rights. Sort of like that slavery thing.Get accused in the South they kill you whether you did it or not. Unless you are Casey Anthony. I wonder if she would have gotten off if she were a black man?
Report thisBy shenebraskan, July 11, 2011 at 10:26 pm Link to this comment
“It inflicts a wholly unnecessary moral stain on a nation that rightly preaches the rule of law to everyone else.”
How does this nation have an ounce of credibility “RIGHTLY” preaching anything regarding the rule of law? Two words: indefinite detention.
We lead the industrialized world in income disparity and percentage of citizens incarcerated, and Mr. Dionne thinks we have a leg to stand on as we preach??
Report thisBy jgaryhimself, July 11, 2011 at 4:21 pm Link to this comment
It is more accurate to refer to the death penalty as government-sanctioned
Report thismurder. These valid foreign policy points aside, there is also no evidence to
suggest that it is a deterrent of any kind and it ends up costing the taxpayers (in
aggregate) more in judicial proceedings than it would cost to house a convict in
prison for life. If one innocent man or woman is murdered by the government as a
result of this craven, morally repugnant institution (and plenty have been), what
right does our government have to exist?
By James M. Martin, July 11, 2011 at 3:26 pm Link to this comment
Thanks, Mr. Dionne. I have never been so ashamed of our governor than when he did not either give this man a new trial or at least allow him to see a Mexican diplomatic official prior to his execution. When you pull all of the silly, non-factual arguments pro-death people raise out from under them they get all huffy and say, “At least he won’t kill again.” This is capitulation to the law of the old desert warlord tribes of the O.T., “an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.” Christians are supposed to forgive. Not that I can see. Jesus don’t like killin’ no matter what the reason is.
Report thisBy California Ray, July 11, 2011 at 11:46 am Link to this comment
An absurd proposition (i.e., that the death penalty is a valid punishment) can only be maintained if absurd methods are used to prop it up. One absurd expedient is that all members of the jury pool who are categorically opposed to capital punishment (such as Roman Catholics) must be excluded from sitting as jurors in death cases. This means that death sentences do not accurately reflect the values of the community as a whole, which is absurd. Another absurdity is that insane prisoners must be forcibly medicated to restore their sanity so that they can understand the actualities of their execution by the state. This means that the delusional are forced into an orientation sufficient to ensure that they die frightened; and that’s absurd.
Report thisCapital punishment is too flawed. Dump it!
By Inherit The Wind, July 11, 2011 at 11:21 am Link to this comment
Our Constitution implies that ratified treaties have the force of Constitutional Law, that they are, by definition, Constitutional, and with good reason: just like our national debt, it is the full faith and DIPLOMATIC credit of the nation than should not and cannot be defaulted on due to DISASTROUS consequences.
The USSC, Rick Perry and the Texas lege has just forced us to renege on our ratified treaty obligations.
Report thisBy gerard, July 11, 2011 at 10:28 am Link to this comment
Use of the death penalty is a form of terroris, and terrorism is a contagious disease.
Report thisBy Billy Pilgrim, July 11, 2011 at 5:30 am Link to this comment
We love the death penalty. It appeals to our warped
Report thisJudeo/Christian sense of justice. Never mind the cases
of innocent prisoners executed; never mind the racist
application of the executions; never mind that
politicians use the death penalty as a wedge issue to
show their constituents that they are tough on crime.
Our Supreme Court is dominated by murderers and
hypocrites; unfeeling automatons bound by ideology and
supposed legal scholarship yet wanting in any sense of
humanity. Those Justices are representative of a people
lacking in empathy and reason.
By Stan Moody, July 11, 2011 at 4:29 am Link to this comment
(Unregistered commenter)
I find myself astounded at the entrenched parochialism
Report thisof right wing politicos…America cannot seem to shake
its wild west ethos…We will be drawing against each
other and locking each other up long after China
reaches the pinnacle of economic power…