Christians and the Death Penalty

From the Anxious Bench archives:

Why should Christians (and other Americans) oppose the death penalty, at least as currently practiced in the United States?

Not because it is unbiblical. A few years ago, Mark Tooley rather helpfully corrected a post of mine on this point. Prior to the particular laws given to Moses, God told Noah and his sons: “Whoso sheddeth man’s blood, by man shall his blood be shed: for in the image of God made he man.” One could debate the extent to which the verse applies to wartime actions; however, the biblical consequences for murder are quite clear. Those who murder others forfeit their own lives in the eyes of God.

Not because it is inherently cruel. It is not inherently immoral, unethical, or cruel to execute individuals whose crimes lead the public to demand the ultimate punishment. Even most opponents of the death penalty will often make exceptions for unusual circumstances, such as in the case of Osama bin Laden or in the case of a serial murderer whose guilt seems entirely conclusive.

“Botched” executions have, perhaps, tilted arguments over the death penalty in the favor of its opponents. It took two hours for a convicted double-murderer in Arizona to die by lethal injection. An attorney for the executed Joseph Wood described his final travails as follows: “About two or three minutes later [after he was sedated], I noticed his lips moved slightly … And then two minutes after that, he was gasping for air. He started breathing. And he was pressing up against the restraining straps. And that went on for about an hour.” It is uncertain whether or not (or how much) pain Wood endured during his execution. Arizona Senator John McCain labeled the process “torture.”

Why did Wood suffer for so long? Lethal injections have become complicated recently, because states face difficulties in utilizing the standard protocol because pharmaceutical companies increasingly refuse to provide the correct drugs. So, who is to blame for whatever cruelty Wood suffered? The state of Arizona? The pharmaceutical companies? In a sense, the more “botched” an execution, the greater the public relations gain for death penalty opponents. The latter and the pharmaceutical companies, one might argue, are playing a very cruel game by their own ethical standards.

There are almost certainly less cruel ways to execute individuals, as Chief Judge Alex Kozinski of the U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals wrote in a dissent to one of Woods’s appeals:

If we as a society want to carry out executions, we should be willing to face the fact that the state is committing a horrendous brutality on our behalf.

If some states and the federal government wish to continue carrying out the death penalty, they must turn away from this misguided path and return to more primitive – and foolproof – methods of execution. The guillotine is probably best but seems inconsistent with our national ethos. And the electric chair, hanging and the gas chamber are each subject to occasional mishaps. The firing squad strikes me as the most promising. Eight or ten large-caliber rifle bullets fired at close range can inflict massive damage, causing instant death every time… Sure, firing squads can be messy, but if we are willing to carry out executions, we should not shield ourselves from the reality that we are shedding human blood.

The gallows humor in this rather chatty dissent strikes me as unusual, but Kozinski’s point is persuasive.

The death penalty’s constitutionality (or comportment with Christian ethics) should not hinge on the particular method used. Perhaps some methods are crueler, but it is a grave act to execute a human being in any event. Nevertheless, the idea that only a death both immediate and free from pain meets either constitutional or biblical standards makes little sense.

– There is a chance slim, that the state will execute an innocent person.

– As with nearly all laws, it is impossible to apply the death penalty with full equity in terms of race and socioeconomic standing.

– It will become increasingly difficult for states to utilize lethal injection, and there is very little public support for more efficient methods such as the return of firing squads.

The death penalty is not inherently unbiblical or un-Christian. It is, however, entirely impractical in today’s United States. As Judge Kozinski writes, “I don’t understand why the game is worth the candle.”