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Cristiano
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Well I think that this is the attitude that a lot of pro-abortion people look at when they want to show that the pro-life movement is hypocritical.
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CMatt25
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But this thread isn’t about abortion or whether the embryo is a person or whether it has personhood rights over the woman’s rights. It’s about lives of people in regard to capital punishment. We should probably try to stay on topic.
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Cristiano
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I was not discussing about personhood and women’s rights. I was discussing the fact that if we say that we can kill a person because it is cost effective then we justify any form of life termination because of cost and that would go in the face of the pro-life movement. The morality of executing a criminal is not defined by its cost, it is simply defined by the reality of the risk of harming people again and by the concept of retribution.
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Ender
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I was referring to CCC 2266 where it says: “Legitimate public authority has the right and duty to inflict penalties commensurate with the gravity of the crime.” I was merely echoing what the Church teaches. Are you disagreeing with what 2266 says?
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CMatt25
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I’m not going to look it up right now. But if you quoted from it then I have no reason to disagree that’s what it says. The thing is to encompass all of CCC on capital punishment you can’t leave out 2267 which goes on to talk about only in very rare if not non-existent cases. It may be changing some. But capital punishment generally in more than just those very rare cases for a long time had the support of a broad cross section of people including most conservatives.
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Rich_Olszewski
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It does not say that the death penalty needs be that commensurate penalty. If a state or nation decides that the penalty commensurate with the gravity of murder is a term of years or life imprisonment, that satisfies the Catechism. Brazil, e.g., has a limit of 35 years imprisonment for murder.
That said, there might be such narrow circumstances as might justify the death penalty. I believe that espionage in time of war is such a circumstance. If a spy is only jailed, he or she can wait out the end of the war, and be freed. But, knowing that a bullet is his fate for his deeds, it might make those anxious to serve their own countries think twice.
Supposedly, some French-speaking British women were willing to be dropped into France to help the Resistance or be spies, saying that they knew the dangers and were bravely willing to give their lives for their country. They were then asked if they were also willing to give their bodies for their country as well, as they could also obtain intelligence by becoming the mistresses of certain German officers. Oddly enough, some balked at that.
It is one thing to give ones life for a just cause, God himself speaks of this,Supposedly, some French-speaking British women were willing to be dropped into France to help the Resistance or be spies, saying that they knew the dangers and were bravely willing to give their lives for their country. They were then asked if they were also willing to give their bodies for their country as well, as they could also obtain intelligence by becoming the mistresses of certain German officers. Oddly enough, some balked at that.
But it is another thing altogether to prostitute off ones body.
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Rich_Olszewski
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The women weren’t prostitutes nor were they to function as prostitutes.
They were asked to voluntarily “give their bodies” (and perhaps even their lives if they failed) for a just cause, that of contributing to the Allied war effort by obtaining information, some critical, unobtainable by any other means to help bring the war to its end sooner.
Becoming a ranking German officer’s mistress so as to wheedle order of battle or future war plan information from the man wasn’t the same as soliciting for sex on a street corner at Place Pigalle.
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JimG
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It’s not a matter of what you or I believe about cost of prosecution. It’s about what prosecutors are able to accomplish with state funds.
It’s not enough to say that the death penalty is not required because states now have the ability to keep convicts locked up for life. I agree that the death penalty is not usually required or necessary, and yes, partly because of the additional exorbitant costs of prosecution, but also because it in the end amounts to an indefinite sentence of up to 20 or more years with only a possibility of an execution ever being carried out.
I was comparing the cost of prosecution between two alternatives which do not involve the death penalty: 1) seeking a conviction and a life sentence, and 2) seeking a conviction and a life sentence with no possibility of parole.
Number 2 is always more expensive and problematic and more difficult to obtain than No. 1.
But No.2 seems to be what the Church has in mind when it says that the death penalty should be rare.
Mostly prosecutors have to settle for No. 1, a plain vanilla life sentence, which always carries the possibility of parole.
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Ender
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Perhaps so, I did say that there might be reasons to oppose capital punishment on practical grounds.
The problem with this argument of course is that the Church has always supported the right of States to employ it. Your charge of barbarism is not directed simply at me but at the Church as well.
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Ender
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True. That, however, is the question that needs to be determined.
No it doesn’t. This is no more true than claiming that whatever you believe is right is therefore right because that’s what you believe. What matters is what punishment actually is commensurate with a crime, not what a particular society believes it to be. If that was all that mattered we could hardly condemn 18th century England for hanging thieves for stealing bread. After all, they thought the penalty commensurate with the crime.
I’ve always thought so too but I’m surprised you think this after claiming: “Fear of punishment has never been a worthwhile deterrent to committing a murder.” Fear of punishment will always deter some and it is unreasonable to assume that the greatest punishment of all is an exception.
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Ender
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What is significant is that the Church recognizes the demand of justice: the punishment must fit the crime. It must be neither too harsh nor too lenient.
2267 talks only about the need for satisfying the secondary objective of protecting society. 2266 talks about the obligation of meeting the primary objective which is retributive justice. How does one “encompass all of CCC on capital punishment” and satisfy both of those passages? We cannot ignore the primary obligation of punishment no matter what 2267 says, so in order to curtail capital punishment as 2267 demands it is necessary to show that the lesser punishment of imprisonment satisfies the obligation of justice defined in 2266.
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Rich_Olszewski
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The Church is not bloodthirsty and doesn’t carry out executions on its own, deferring to the civil authorities. If the civil authorities determine that life imprisonment or 35 years is the proper punishment for murder, then it is.
The civil rulers are who determine what punishment actually is commensurate with a crime. I may be wrong, but I’ve never read anything where the Church says, “this long for burglary, this long for assault, this long for manslaughter,” etc.
You are correct. Those were different times that called for different punishments, usually more severe than anyone today would ask for. A 7 year old girl in 18th century England was hanged for stealing a glass inkwell. It cut no ice with the judge that the theft was motivated by that poor child’s desire to have something beautiful.
Espionage during a time of war is appropriate, not to have the punishment fit the crime, but to demonstrate that there is no reprieve from that particular punishment in time of war. Jail a spy and all he or she must do is sit in prison until being released.
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Rich_Olszewski
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Yes, but people were more barbaric in ceturies past, clergymen and laity alike. I’d not blame the Church when it was the attitude of its members accepting a barbarism who were at fault.
This is not to say that there are not some extremely narrow circumstances when the death penalty might be necessary - as in my example of espionage.
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Ender
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The Church’s position on capital punishment cannot be dismissed as merely the “attitude of its members”. It was and is doctrine and if it is a barbaric practice then it is a barbaric doctrine and it took the Church 2000 years to correct the error. So much for her claim of “fulfilling her mission of authentically interpreting God’s law.” (Veritatis Splendor)
I’m confused by this. If capital punishment is barbaric then how can it be permissible in any circumstance whatever? Do the narrow ends justify the barbaric means?
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CMatt25
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Maybe state funds need to be increased then and people be willing to pay the cost so as not to either put people to death. Nor to release them too early if that’s a problem.
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CMatt25
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Well that’s simple. 2267 tells you that. The punishment should not be the state killing people except in very rare if not non existent cases.
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RACJ
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I disagree. In my own Scranton area, there are numerous cases which merit death. I would be very comfortable as a juror imposing death upon these killers. Too many languish, and ultimately are released by bleeding heart scoundrel governors. The death penalty brings justice to the victimized families, and should be implemented promptly, within months of the murders, if possible. Rob :(
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pnewton
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The Church used to support the use of the death penalty with the justice system was far worse than it is today.
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Ender
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This same argument would justify the hanging of the seven year old girl: it too was what the civil authorities determined to be proper. The point is that the meaning of “commensurate” is not simply arbitrary. It is pointless to even use the word if its definition changes from one country to the next or from one time to another. Surely you feel that hanging a young girl for a petty theft goes well beyond commensurate. If the word has no particular meaning then the entire sentence it is used in is also meaningless.
Civil rulers determine what punishments to impose. That does not mean that the punishments they inflict are in fact commensurate with the crimes. The severity of a crime does not change from one place or time to another and neither should the punishment.
Is the severity of a murder different today than it was a thousand years ago? Of course not therefore “the times” do not call for different punishments. Since the severity of the crime does not change neither can the severity of the punishment (within a limited spectrum).
Again, no. If the punishment does not fit the crime then it is unjust and there is no time when an unjust punishment is appropriate.
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