Ugly Irony In High Court Death Penalty On Day The Pope Comes To Visit

By James Donahue

Those of us who have long opposed the wickedness of our nation’s rush to execute every person found guilty of murder and other high crimes were not surprised, but disappointed in the Supreme Court’s decision this week to approve lethal injection as a form of killing prisoners.

We find strange symbolism in the fact that the ruling was handed down on the very day Pope Benedict XVI arrived to visit at the White House. It was almost as if the court was handing the pontiff a special blood-stained gift. The Pope, of course, represents an old Christian dogma that drives followers into convicting criminals to death.

The very act of killing the killer has been an age-old formula set by ancient laws followed by the Hebrews, said to have been handed down by God to Moses when he stood on Mount Sinai. Indeed, it wasn’t just ten commandments received (or perhaps conceived) by Moses during that historic event, but rather a long list of laws, now recorded in the Book of Deuteronomy, that have influenced the social legal system for thousands of years.

Fortunately, not all of the “sins” that resulted in the killing of the sinner remain on the books today. They included such things as adultery, turning to other “gods” or religions, or psychic functioning. Anyone found guilty of such behavior was stoned to death in the public square.

While Moses and his tribe may have condoned it, the act of murdering the accused has never been the best solution, especially in cases where there may be a question as to the real guilt of the person standing accused.

That was a problem then and it is even more of a problem in the United States today, where we have overzealous police and prosecutors willing to make cases against suspected killers with what turns out to be sloppy investigative work. Proof of false arrest has been found in a broad number of such cases now that DNA techniques have been developed and used to help prove the innocence of people living on death row.

We have to wonder how many innocent men and women have been put to death, either by such barbaric means as hanging, the electric chair, or lethal injection, since it all began. That the right-wing Christian-packed Bush Administration would remain in power long enough to stack the high court with people who still support this archaic mindset is tragic.

In fairness to President Bush, however, the vote was 7-2 to reject challenges to the Kentucky executions by lethal injection, claiming the procedure was inhumane. And Justice John Paul Stevens, while concurring with the judgment, wrote that he now believed capital punishment itself is unconstitutional. He suggested that this week’s ruling might serve to stir the debate over banning it altogether.

Unless new legal challenges are sent forth, we may be in for a bloody year ahead. Executions across the country have been on hold since the Kentucky case went before the high court in 2007. At least two dozen executions are about to be carried out now that the court has given the green light to killing once again.