Reality Check 101

The recent arrest in the 27-year-old Janet Chandler murder case was a feat of law enforcement prowess that deserves high praise. Sadly, even if convicted, her executioner will never experience the terror or suffer the same price that their innocent victim did.

Michiganwas the first state in the union to protect the lives of murderers. But it wasn’t until after World War II that the move away from capital punishment finally took root. In theUnited States, state legislatures began addressing the issue but by the mid-1960s, representative government was being sidestepped in favor of state and federal courts.  A watershed decision by the U.S. Supreme Court occurred in 1972. The Furman decision invalidated existing capital punishment statues in every state. For four years Furman stood; until, in 1976, the high court reversed itself because new sentencing guidelines had developed. 2005 saw the latest move by the Supreme Court. Basing its decision not primarily on the Constitution or existing statutes, but on “evolving standards of decency” and “international opinion,” the court declared execution unconstitutional for anyone who committed murder before they were 18 years old.

Public sentiment against the death penalty is, in many circumstances, based on widely disseminated misinformation. For example, alleged racism in sentencing and non-deterrence can both be argued — but only by using a certain mix of numbers. Only about 10 percent of all murders qualify for the death penalty and since 1973 only 14 percent of that 10 percent have actually received the ultimate sentence. If that 2 percent is compared with the numbers of murders, white murderers are twice as likely to receive the death penalty and are actually executed 12 to 15 months sooner. Studies have also demonstrated that each execution of the factually guilty saves from three to 18 innocent lives.

Even though it should be irrelevant, cost is raised as an issue as well. But when genuine death penalty convictions are compared only to capital punishment-qualified life without parole convictions, and all expenses are included (geriatric care, the communicable disease epidemic, in-prison violence and more), the death penalty is significantly less expensive.

Capital punishment opponents are properly concerned about executing innocent people. Here again a reality check is in order. Both state and federal laws recognize a difference between legal innocence and actual (factual) innocence. Legal innocence is frequently granted because of weak evidence, rights violations, sympathetic juries, mistrials, clemency and much more; none of which may prove anything about guilt or innocence. Death row inmates are six times more likely to leave on appeals rather than by execution. Since 1973, at least 2,500 people have been “exonerated” with only a handful claiming factual innocence. With data reaching back to 1900 there is no proof of any factually innocent person being executed. The system works.

Still, is capital punishment a human rights problem? It is an odd question when society’s worse human rights violators have steadily developed a reputation for being the victims. God, who perfectly balances justice with mercy and recompense with forgiveness, has spoken to the issue. Before there was human government, before there was written law, before there was Scripture, God stated an enduring principle for all ages. Rooted in creation itself and in the pricelessness of creation’s glory, human life in the Creator’s image, He gave only one alternative for its desecration– life for life (Gen 9:5-7).   At the inception of Old Testament law, the principle was restated for the record in the Sixth Commandment and its consequences invoked only 25 verses later (Exodus 20:13-21:12). Throughout the remaining pages of the Bible, God both through human agents and through direct interventions, imposed the death penalty. Out of all the Old Testament crimes allowing for execution as the severest penalty, deliberate murder was the only one for which there was no other option.

Neither Jesus nor His apostles ever challenged existing death penalty Scriptures or governmental authority. Their love and forgiveness principles were interpersonal, not civil. In a genuine sense, Christ’s own sacrificial crucifixion depended on the validity of the life-for-life principle. After all is said and done final authority must rest with moral accuracy. Society cannot afford to so enhance the value of murderer’s lives and so denigrate the value of victim’s lives that there becomes no moral (or legal) difference.