"The Yoke of a European Monarch"

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This is a statement from Texas Governor Rick Perry:

230 years ago, our forefathers fought a war to throw off the yoke of a European monarch and gain the freedom of self-determination. Texans long ago decided that the death penalty is a just and appropriate punishment for the most horrible crimes committed against our citizens. While we respect our friends in Europe, welcome their investment in our state and appreciate their interest in our laws, Texans are doing just fine governing Texas.


The emphasis is mine. What was he responding to? Well it was this call for a moratorium on the death penalty from the European Union:


The European Union is unreservedly opposed to the use of capital punishment under all circumstances and has consistently called for the universal abolition of this punishment. We believe that elimination of the death penalty is fundamental to the protection of human dignity, and to the progressive development of human rights. We further consider this punishment to be cruel and inhumane. There is no evidence to suggest that the use of the death penalty serves as a deterrent against violent crime and the irreversibility of the punishment means that miscarriages of justice - which are inevitable in all legal systems – cannot be redressed. Consequently, the death penalty has been abolished throughout the European Union.

In countries that maintain the use of capital punishment, the European Union seeks the progressive restriction of both its scope and the number of offences for which capital punishment may be employed, as defined in several human rights instruments.

In this regard, the European Union welcomes the United States Supreme Court rulings of June 2002 and March 2005 declaring the execution of persons with mental retardation and the execution of juveniles respectively, to be unconstitutional. The European Union urges the US authorities to extend these restrictions, in particular, to the execution of persons with severe mental illness. The European Union welcomes the US commitment to the Vienna Convention on Consular Relations (VCCR). However, the European Union regrets the US decision to withdraw from the Optional Protocol of the VCCR, which gives the ICJ jurisdiction over disputes arising from the convention.

The EU appreciates and values its co-operation with the US on a wide range of human rights concerns around the world. The European Union therefore takes this opportunity to renew its call for a moratorium to be placed on the application of the death penalty, by both the US federal and state authorities, in anticipation of its legal abolition.

The Candidate Countries Turkey, Croatia* and the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia*, the Countries of the Stabilisation and Association Process and potential candidates Bosnia and Herzegovina, Montenegro, Serbia, and the EFTA countries Iceland, Liechtenstein and Norway, members of the European Economic Area, as well as Ukraine, the Republic of Moldova, Armenia and Azerbaijan align themselves with this declaration.


There are logical reasons one can support the death penalty. I would have hoped Governor Perry could have articulated some of them. I don't think the death penalty stands up to a rigorous scrutiny because the death penalty is basically a crapshoot. It is random, and as a result unconstitutional. That's just my view. I'm sure the majority of Texans believe in it, and also believe it makes their state safer.



Comments

Ole Windahl Pedersen said…
While one needs not be a Texan to agree with Governor Perry’s statement that Texans are doing a good job governing Texas - if it implied that they would merely leave it at that. However, Texas’ high rate of executions has ramifications outside the state as well. In 2004, the State of Texas carried out almost half of the total number of executions in the entire US (24 out of a total 51 - source: The Death Penalty Information Center). While this might be considered “just fine governing” in Texas, it would most likely give pause for thought elsewhere across the US continent.

Whether the death penalty is unconstitutional or not, it remains nothing but a badly carried out act of vengeance. Although criminologists could deliver interesting discussions on the importance of vengeance in criminal law systems, any liberal democracy that deserves to be taken seriously should ban the use of death penalty without hesitation. Though Governor Perry would win little domestic sympathy in Texas for nixing the death penalty, this is an area where the yoke of the European monarch rightly comes back to haunt him.
27 August 2007 at 18:34
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