Death penalty debate still alive after Supreme Court decision in Baze v. Rees

Death penalty debate still alive after Supreme Court decision in <u>Baze v. Rees</u>

Commentary

Death penalty debate still alive after Supreme Court decision in Baze v. Rees

April 21, 2008 05:18:00 pm

Edited by:

Richard C. Dieter [Executive Director, Death Penalty Information Center]: "On April 16, the U.S. Supreme Court issued a splintered decision on the constitutionality of Kentucky's lethal injection process. Despite the seven different opinions, there were many aspects of the decision that were not surprising, and a few aspects which most people did not see coming. It was not surprising that Chief Justice Roberts held that as long as the death penalty is constitutional, there must be a lawful way of carrying it out. And it is long-standing doctrine that the Eighth Amendment does not require that methods for carrying out punishment be absolutely painless. It was not even surprising that the Court upheld Kentucky's execution process, given that the state had only carried out one lethal injection and did not have an extensive record revealing the myriad problems that have been exposed in other states.

It is likely that challenges to lethal injection will continue around the country. Inmates will attempt to show, based on extensive hearings, recent discovery, and examples of botched executions, that their state differs substantially from Kentucky in the way it carries out lethal injections. In some instances, they will be able to show that alternatives are readily available and have been recommended by a variety of experts. Some states may have to make changes in their training of personnel, supervision of the execution, or the drugs they apply if executions are to resume.

It was perhaps surprising that a number of the Justices expressed their concerns about the paralyzing effects of the second drug, pancuronium bromide. This is the drug that hides the inmate's pain that is at the core of this controversy. Although states are not compelled to abandon this paralytic and change from the three-drug protocol based on Kentucky's experience, part of the Court seemed to be saying that it would be wise for them to do so. Chief Justice Roberts said that the Court has relied on the states to find more humane methods of execution, even when they are not specifically compelled to do so.

Finally, Justice Stevens' conclusion that he now regards the death penalty itself as unconstitutional came as a revelation to many people. On the whole, the arguments and decision in Baze v. Rees were devoid of the larger questions that usually surround capital punishment. Justice Stevens forced the Court to consider whether death penalty itself had become detached from any discernible state purpose. If it is just the pointless extinguishing of human life, then it cannot be justified, no matter what the method being used. Judging by the many editorials that have been written since the decision last week, this issue may have struck a chord that is reverberating around the country. That challenge may be much harder for the Court to resolve."

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Martin Luther King Jr. wrote his Letter from Birmingham Jail

On April 16, 1963, an incarcerated Martin Luther King, Jr. (arrested for demonstrating in defiance of a court order) wrote his Letter from Birmingham Jail in response to a published statement by eight fellow clergymen from Alabama.

Part of the letter read: We have waited for more than 340 years for our constitutional and God-given rights. The nations of Asia and Africa are moving with jetlike speed toward gaining political independence, but we stiff creep at horse-and-buggy pace toward gaining a cup of coffee at a lunch counter. Perhaps it is easy for those who have never felt the stinging dark of segregation to say, "Wait." But when you have seen vicious mobs lynch your mothers and fathers at will and drown your sisters and brothers at whim; when you have seen hate-filled policemen curse, kick and even kill your black brothers and sisters; when you see the vast majority of your twenty million Negro brothers smothering in an airtight cage of poverty in the midst of an affluent society; when you suddenly find your tongue twisted and your speech stammering as you seek to explain to your six-year-old daughter why she can't go to the public amusement park that has just been advertised on television, and see tears welling up in her eyes when she is told that Funtown is closed to colored children, and see ominous clouds of inferiority beginning to form in her little mental sky, and see her beginning to distort her personality by developing an unconscious bitterness toward white people; when you have to concoct an answer for a five-year-old son who is asking: "Daddy, why do white people treat colored people so mean?"; when you take a cross-county drive and find it necessary to sleep night after night in the uncomfortable corners of your automobile because no motel will accept you; when you are humiliated day in and day out by nagging signs reading "white" and "colored"; when your first name becomes "nigger," your middle name becomes "boy" (however old you are) and your last name becomes "John," and your wife and mother are never given the respected title "Mrs."; when you are harried by day and haunted by night by the fact that you are a Negro, living constantly at tiptoe stance, never quite knowing what to expect next, and are plagued with inner fears and outer resentments; when you are forever fighting a degenerating sense of "nobodiness" then you will understand why we find it difficult to wait. There comes a time when the cup of endurance runs over, and men are no longer willing to be plunged into the abyss of despair. I hope, sirs, you can understand our legitimate and unavoidable impatience. Read the full text of the Letter.