So, I was all prepared to write an article on the International Day against the Death Penalty, as it’s something that I feel very strongly about. Then I discovered that Alistair Carmichael, who is by day Deputy Leader of the Scottish Liberal Democrats and by night lurks in the shadows of the Palace of Westminster as the Liberal Democrats’ chief whip, had got there first, in today’s Scotsman. And let’s face it, his will be better than anything I can produce.
Alistair has campaigned against the death penalty for many years after visiting Kenny Richey on Death Row. He met the family of Troy Davis, executed in Georgia last year even though the evidence against him had all but evaporated, both in the US and in London.
He wrote today:
To be clear, the overwhelming majority of those on death row are guilty of the crimes of which they were convicted.
Our legal system, however, has always been clear that justice and vengeance are different things.
There is little evidence of any deterrent effect from using the death penalty. Many of those jurisdictions that use it are among the most violent in the world. When balanced against the risk of miscarriages of justice that can never be reversed it becomes a no-brainer.
The use of the death penalty is not just inhumane to those on death row but is also dehumanising to the communities that use it.
He went on to talk about the UK being a world leader against the death penalty, with Vince Cable banning the export of drugs used in executions overseas. He mentioned how Lib Dem Peer Lord MacDonald went to California to campaign in the referendum on abolishing the death penalty. Interestingly, a recent Wall Street Journal article shows that even conservatives are starting to question the death penalty on grounds, not of human rights, but on cost of all things.
Alistair reminded us that with places like Gambia and Japan ramping up their use of the death penalty, there was much for opponents to do.
You can read the whole article here.
* Caron Lindsay is Editor of Liberal Democrat Voice and blogs at Caron's Musings. You can find her on Bluesky at caronmlindsay.bsky.social
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5 Comments
There was no telling the Tory’s in 1987 that capital costs more, so I will remember that…if trying to tell the Tories something obvious, logical and to their own liking (taxpayers money and all that), expect it to take 25 years to start sinking in. You see usually, I will tell anyone who wants my vote what they need to do to get it, but when it is a Tory asking I cannot do that, I would have to say “Hang yourself, preferably for something you did not do, but even if you did.”
In the meantime Alistair and Vince are superheros.
I find it sad that people in favour can’t see that is DOES dehumanise them.
Had this the other day with several colleagues who thought a certain man in the news should be left to the hands of the mob for what he is alleged to have done.
I suspect a lot of it is angry talk. I hope that if they were faced with another human being, they wouldn’t beat him to a pulp. But talking about it, they couldn’t see that bloodlust reflected on them in any way at all.
Frankly, I have never been convinced that people are not deterred by death, but are deterred by life.
If this was true, it would mean that death was viewed as a less terrifying fate than life imprisonment, so arguing against the death penalty would hardly be the act of a merciful man.
I suspect you’ve put your finger on a hidden tautology there. I think the kind of person who could see that it dehumanised them wouldn’t be the kind of person to support the death penalty in the first place.
Alistair’s campaign reminds us of why we are Liberals. It is all the braver to take this stand when – in the febrile atmosphere generated by the current case in Wales – many politicians would consider it politically more expedient to keep their heads down.