[Diamond]

I’m always amazed at the number of conservative who entrust the government with the power to kill.

Maybe you think that only abortionists should have the power to kill?

Just about everybody already has the raw power to kill other human beings. The question is whether the killing is just or unjust.

The state has been delegated not only the power, but the authority and attendant duty to punish those who commit murder and other crimes. The state does not have authority to punish the innocent. If in those cases of offenses worthy of death the state refuses to execute the guilty it commits injustice itself, and thus fails in its primary duty. If that is your prescription, what you will end up with in the long run is a government that punishes the innocent and lets the guilty go free.

Cordially,

[MinnesotaLibertarian]

The state does not have authority to punish the innocent.

The state also has the primary responsibilty for determining who the innocent are. Yes, there are jurors, but who picks them? The state has the power to kill the guilty, and to determine who the guilty are. Essentially, that gives them the power to kill anyone.

If that is your prescription, what you will end up with in the long run is a government that punishes the innocent and lets the guilty go free.

How do you come up with that? First of all, we're not talking about letting people free, we're talking about whether to execute them. Secondly, I understand the concern about letting the guilty go free, but to me that's preferable than having innocent people locked up or God forbid executed. As for "punishing the innocent", most people who commit murders are not serial killers. Also, serial killers are very unlikey to wrongly be found not guilty for every single murder they've committed, given the amount of evidence to work with.