Death penalty abolitionists to march on Austin

This Saturday, anti-death-penalty activists will descend on Austin, TX, for the 10th Annual March to Abolish the Death Penalty.  The march will begin and end at the Texas Capitol Building and will culminate in a rally that will feature speeches from three now-exonerated former death row inmates as well as individuals involved with the case of Cameron Todd Willingham (which I highlighted in a previous article).  Information about the rally can be found at marchforabolition.org.

The organizers and participants in the march will be fighting yet another battle in a war that should have long been over.  Now that Japan has appointed death penalty abolitionist Keiko Chiba as justice minister, effectively eliminating capital punishment since she would have to sign off on any execution, the United States is the only country in the "developed world" that still puts criminals to death.

Capital punishment is not simply a moral issue.  It makes no pragmatic sense.  It is now well known that it actually costs more to put a prisoner to death than it does to incarcerate him or her for life.  Basically, we are paying more for a policy that results in no tangible benefits, but does result in more dead people (kind of like our current health care system).  In fact, murder rates are consistently higher in states that do execute prisoners than in those that do not.

The fact of the matter is that the death penalty is simply not an effective deterrent over imprisonment for life, which is the sentence a would-be death row inmate serves where capital punishment is not an option.  Such crimes are not the type to result in the limited sentences and parole that other, "lesser" murders do.  In crimes of passion, reason and consequences, such as potential punishment, simply do not factor into a killer's decision making until after the deed is done, if at all.  In the instance of a cold, calculated murder, the perpetrator's intention is not to get caught at all, effectively rendering severity of punishment irrelevent.  As for any case on the spectrum between these two extremes, life in prison is akin to capital punishment in the sense that it keeps convicted murderers off the streets and results in the loss of their lives as free citizens.  Therefore, it is unlikely that someone deterred from killing by the prospect of execution would somehow be emboldened by "only" facing life in prison.  Thus, the "benefits" of the more expensive option of capital punishment are negligible.

A key benefit of life imprisonment over the death penalty is the obvious fact that it keeps inmates alive.  This can prove to be invaluable in the instance of an overturned conviction.  Advancements in forensic science, such as the use of DNA as evidence, have repeatedly exposed the fallibility of our legal system.  (This is not meant to critique that system, but simply to show that, as with any other human system, it is far from perfect.)  The chilling fact that the government has unwittingly executed innocent people on numerous occasions has been made painfully clear.  Organizers and speakers at the march and rally will be highlighting the story of Cameron Todd Willingham, who was executed by the state of Texas in 2004 after a conviction based on flawed evidence.  A petition, which will be presented at the march, for Texas Governor Rick Perry to acknowledge Willingham's innocence can be found here.

Capital punishment raises countless moral dilemmas while producing little to nothing in terms of real results.  In essence, it is nothing more than an expensive and elaborate method of societal revenge.  Unsurprisingly, the rest of the "developed world" has decided to abandon it.  It is time the United States joined them.  I strongly urge anyone who is in the Austin area to attend the rally on Saturday.  Also, I have signed the aforementioned petition to Gov. Perry and would like to ask you to do so as well.