Posted on 03/14/2014 9:18:55 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
The year was 1573, and 19-year-old Frantz Schmidt was beheading stray dogs in his back yard. He was not a troubled teenager in need of psychological attention. Frantz was practicing for his life's calling.
Unlike teens today, Frantz didn't have to decide what he wanted to be when he grew up. Male teens followed in their fathers' footsteps. For Frantz, that meant becoming an executioner. It also meant having to live with enormous social stigma.
Despite the shame, Frantz, a Lutheran, believed his executioner's role was divinely sanctioned. Martin Luther wrote that "the hand that wields the sword and strangles is … no longer man's hand but God's." Executioners, he believed, are "very useful and even merciful," since they stop villains and deter crime. Historian Joel Harrington (The Faithful Executioner, Macmillan, 2013) called Luther's comment "a celebrity endorsement for the profession." If there is a lack of hangmen and you are qualified, Luther urged, apply for the job.
Luther believed that civic order is divinely ordained. The cities of Frantz's native Bavaria had been plagued by bandits, feuds between noble houses, and roving knights who supported themselves by pillaging. Bavaria needed a justice system to curb such violence and discourage vengeance and vendettas.
Nevertheless, Luther's endorsement was sharply at odds with the teachings of the early church Fathers. They didn't oppose the state's use of capital punishment. They didn't even address that question, since Christianity was still a countercultural minority with an ethic for "resident aliens."
But as Ron Sider noted in The Early Church on Killing (Baker Academic, 2012), those Fathers who discussed capital punishment found it unthinkable that a follower of Christ could take a life, even as part of a judicial sentence.
(Excerpt) Read more at christianitytoday.com ...
I’m a social conservative, but I question whether the state should be killing people.
I prosecuted a number of death penalty cases. And there is no question that some of those people are for whom the death penalty was made.
But over time I realized that Society’s focus on capital punishment is wrong. The focus should be on the fact that there is absolutely NO question that we put innocent people to death. For me, it is not worth “killing your loved one” by “mistake” in order to execute the Charles Mansons of the world. I have also become a wary of the State having the power to execute it’s citizens.
In short. We should not have the death penalty in a civilized society.
“Whoso sheddeth the blood of man, shall by man have his blood be shed. For in the image of God, made he man.” - Genesis
I don’t see capital punishment as “the state” killing people. I see it as the people collectively enacting punishment for crimes committed. And the punishment should fit the crime.
I do believe, however, that Capital Punishment should be reserved for pre-meditated and heinous crimes. I’m not a lawyer but I think that’s murder in the first degree. And there should be sufficient proof (dna, etc) or a confession.
Not everybody agrees, this is just my view.
The death penalty goes back further than Moses. After the flood, God told Noah “If man spills the blood of another man, then by man will his blood be spilled.”
Actually, a "civilized society" is exactly where it does belong.
The problem is that "civilized society" has been replaced by government.
Government is the greediest, most corrupt and murderous force on Earth.
It's too much to go into here, and no one would believe me anyway, since "that was all done away with!"
A Pandora’s box of considerations here.
Ultimately the norm of the shedding of blood as reprisal for the shedding of blood comes from the covenant with Noah. That doesn’t have anything to do with salvation of souls, but with keeping of order on earth. One sin is considered bad enough to justify promptly ousting the perpetrator from this mortal coil. Blood feuds must be stopped cold and the responsibility was given to people.
Further capital penalty provisions in the Old Testament regime for the Hebrew people were peculiar to those people. One could be stoned to death for breaking the Sabbath, for instance. It also needed more than one witness, so private sins and public ones were treated differently. And the witnesses had to cast the first stones. And a witness in such a case found to be false would end up being stoned himself. What we know as modern circumstantial evidence cases would not be brought. Also the annual atonement ceremonies would pardon any outstanding sins in the community. The system, with its deep God consciousness, had a lot of grace in it, more in fact than our modern secular world. Comparing the two are not fair to the bible, to God, or to man.
There are many problems with the death penalty, the most problematic and dispositive being that, IMO, it is utterly unjust because it is double jeopardy. The “punishment” of the death penalty for the acts of everyone were totally paid for, punished, and condemned on the cross of Christ 2000 years ago. Jesus was punished and died for the very acts a criminal (or anyone) is put to death for. So the punishment of death is double jeopardy. Therefore, punishment is an illegitimate and unjust purpose in the penal system. The legitimate purpose of dealing with dangerous criminals is incarceration to protect society from danger.
Here’s a short list of answers to the excuses often used for the death penalty:
EXCUSE: The death penalty serves justice because it's an "eye for an eye."
ANSWER: Fair enough except for one problem: Somebody has already paid "an eye for an eye" for those criminals and their heinous acts, so unjust double jeopardy is in play here.
EXCUSE: Victims and their family are not justly served and have no closure.
ANSWER: Countless personal and professional examples testify to the fact that there is only one way victims of savagery can recover from the hurt and angst of victimization: forgiveness. Revenge feels good for awhile but does not relieve the pain.
EXCUSE: Protecting society.
ANSWER: You lock up dangerous criminals to protect society.
EXCUSE: It’s too costly to keep them in prison. Why should society have to pay for their incarceration?
ANSWER: Well I guess there is such thing as killing criminals for convenience, but let's take another tack which hits directly at our medieval penal system: prisoners should be productive and at least pay their way in prison.
I am all for the death penalty in open shut cases like the Colorado movie massacre. I don’t care why he did it, he shouldn’t be alive. The reason our society is becoming less civilized is because it takes so long for justice to be done. The killers see it and interpret a squishy society that can be taken advantage of. I put child killers and molesters in the same category. Child molesters being let off with light sentences is an abomination and only endangers more kids. Hasten justice and it’s severity when the case is UNMISTAKABLY CLEAR and you’ll see things improve.
Save the appeals process for less clear cases and lesser crimes.
The death penalty is a just punishment, but there should be no tolerance for overzealous prosecutions. It’s either guilty or not guilty with the punishment fitting the crime, not a lesser punishment incase we are mistaken.
If a person is halakhically convicted of a capital offense then he is to be halakhically executed. Not to do so would be a violation of G-d's commandments.
However, the requirements of a halakhic conviction would make the death penalty very rare (confessions are inadmissible, for example).
The state represents the victims who cannot represent themselves. If the victim is dead, and has no relatives, who,should stand in for the victim?
>In short. We should not have the death penalty in a civilized society.
Murder doesn’t happen in a “civilized society”.
If they executed all the Charles Mansons, there would be thousands of executions of absolute no-doubters.
The problem is that society is not civilized and is as deliberately arbitrary in whom it executes, and on what evidence, as murderers are in selecting their victims.
First, civilize society, then consider abolishing the death penalty.
The Apostle Paul deals with this issue directly. With regard to the State exercising the dealth penalty he said, “but if you do what is evil, be afraid; for it does not bear the sword for nothing; for it is a minister of God, an avenger who brings wrath on the one who practices evil.” Romans 13:4
He’ll be the last they execute.
The more open and shut the case, the longer the supply of pro bono legal support.
We love the most certain murderers and are therefore not civilized.
Those who keep murderers from the gallows by legal or political means are as uncivilized as the murderers themselves.
The appeals process is also far too long and drawn out, intentionally. There are only so many court levels. But lawyers and judges (who used to be just lawyers) have set all this up.
You’re right. Justice should be as fair as possible and as swift as possible. If that means more judges are necessary, or some other reform, the so be it.
In theory at least I've got nothing against hanging somebody like Manson, Dennis Rader, Paul Bernardo, John Mohammed...
Here's the problem: I'd want several changes to the system before I could feel good about capital punishment anymore.
1. Guilt should be beyond any doubt whatsoever; the usual criteria of guilt "beyond a reasonable doubt" doesn't cut it for hanging somebody.
2. The person in question must represent a continuing threat to society should he ever escape or otherwise get loose. The "bird man" of Alcatraz would not qualify, John Mohammed clearly would.
3. I'd want all career/money incentives for convicting people of crimes gone which would mean scrapping the present "adversarial" system of justice in favor of something like the French "inquisitorial" system in which the common objective of all parties involved was a determination of facts.
4. I'd want there to be no societal benefit to keeping the person alive. Cases in which this criteria would prevent hanging somebody would include "Son of Sam" who we probably should want to study more than hang, or Timothy McVeigh who clearly knew more than the public ever was allowed to hear.
Given all of that I could feel very good about hanging Charles Manson, John Muhammed, or Paul Bernardo, but that's about what it would take.
In fact in a totally rational world the job of District Attorney as it is known in America would not exist. NOBODY should ever have any sort of a career or money incentive for sending people to prison, much less for executing people. The job of District Attorney in America seems to involve almost limitless power and very little resembling accountability and granted there is no shortage of good people who hold the job, the combination has to attract the wrong kinds of people as well.
They expected DNA testing to eliminate the prime suspect in felony cases in something like one or two percent of cases and many people were in states of shock when that number came back more like 33 or 35%. That translates into some fabulous number of people sitting around in prisons for stuff they don't know anything at all about since the prime suspect in a felony case usually goes to prison. Moreover, in a state like Texas which executes a hundred people a year or thereabouts, that has to translate into innocent people being executed here and there.
But the kicker is the adversarial system of justice. THAT we'd need to get rid of, with or without any consideration of death penalties. The price we're paying for it is too high. The job of District Attorney in America seems to involve almost limitless power and very little resembling accountability; granted there is no shortage of good people who hold the job, the combination clearly attracts the wrong kinds of people as well. DA is often the first rung in the ladder of political careers and some of those careers are paved with the blood and shattered lives of innocents. Cases which are well known and easy to research on the internet include those of Janet Reno and her witch hunts, Scott Harshbarger, Mike Nifong, Martha Cloakley who almost became a US senator from Massachusetts, Ronnie Earle who managed to convict Tom Delay of being a Republican, that lunatic sheriff of Wenatchee Wa. who almost succeeded in having Wenatchee disincorporated when it could no longer buy insurance, the prosecutors in that hideous David Camm case in Indiana... there doesn't seem to be any shortage of people who should not be holding that job.
For someone to say they are conservative but support capital punishment is to say they think the Government screws up everything it touches.....except the death penalty.
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