News and Developments 2009: Editorials

EDITORIAL: "There is No 'Humane' Execution"

Posted: December 21, 2009
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A recent New York Times editorial commented on the new one-drug lethal injection protocol used in Ohio for the first time on December 8, but concluded that "the execution only reinforced that any form of capital punishment is legally suspect and morally wrong."  The Times agreed with the late Justice Harry Blackmun who called such manipulations “tinker[ing] with the machinery of death.”  The editorial also noted the risks of exeucting the innocent: "It has also become clear — particularly since DNA evidence has become more common — how unreliable the system is. Since 1973, 139 people have been released from death row because of evidence that they were innocent, according to the Death Penalty Information Center."  The editors ended by saying that repealing the death penalty "is the way to eliminate the inevitable problems with executions."  Read the full editorial below.

EDITORIALS: Is An Execution Worth the Price?

Posted: December 16, 2009
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A recent editorial in the Virginian-Pilot called for eliminating the death penalty as a good way to address the $3.5 billion gap in the state's budget.  "Doing away with the option of a death sentence makes sense on several levels," the editors wrote.  "It would save the state from having to pay fees associated with lengthy trials and years of appeals. It would end the agony of repeated court hearings for the families of victims. It would eliminate the four perpetually understaffed capital defender's offices, whose attorneys handle appeals automatically generated when people are sentenced to death row."  The paper suggests that the $2 million spent per execution could be better put toward education, public safety and crime prevention efforts.  "Is the cost of an execution really worth it when, for less than half the price, we could put a killer in a prison cell, locked away from society for life?"  Read the full editorial below.

EDITORIALS: "Death penalty just too costly"

Posted: November 04, 2009
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A recent opinion piece by the Editorial Director of the Clarion-Ledger in Mississippi points to the high costs of the death penalty as a way in which arbitrariness enters into the application of capital punishment: “When is a crime a crime deserving of death?," David Hampton asks.  "When the county can afford it, of course.” The paper supports the death penalty but the Editorial Director offered the example of Hinds County District Attorney Robert Shuler Smith, who said his county cannot afford to prosecute death penalty cases. The author noted, “It's a matter of how much ‘justice‘ the county can afford. But if one county can ‘afford‘ to send someone to death row and another can't, isn't that another example of how inequitable the death penalty can be?“ Hampton also cited geographical location as contributing to the death penalty’s arbitrary nature. “Ironically, it is very difficult to get a death penalty jury sentence in Hinds County anyway. Prosecutors have avoided seeking death for that reason. Yet, another jury in a different county with a different racial or gender makeup might not hesitate." The author concludes: "The death penalty costs too much, literally and in many, many other ways."  Read full text below.

EDITORIALS: The Price of Death

Posted: October 31, 2009
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A recent editorial in America Magazine entitled The Price of Death reviewed the growing problems with the death penalty and stated, "It is time for the nation to conclude once and for all that in our civilized society there is no place for capital punishment."  The national Catholic weekly cited the recently botched execution in Ohio, racial disparities, and the possibility of executing the innocent as reasons why public support for capital punishment has declined.  The  editorial also pointed to the high costs of the death penalty as a reason for acting now: "During the current recession, revenue-starved states are looking closely at the cost of capital punishment. According to the nonprofit Death Penalty Information Center in Washington, D.C., death penalty cases typically require huge expenditures, partly because of re-trials to correct prior errors. California’s Commission on the Fair Administration of Justice, for example, has estimated that the state is spending $138 million a year on the death penalty. . . .Lawmakers, forced by the budget crisis to make cuts in basic services like schools, law enforcement, health care and libraries, must rethink such outlays for capital punishment."

EDITORIALS: "Time for America to Move Past Capital Punishment"

Posted: October 29, 2009
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A recent editorial from the Aurora Sentinel in Colorado commented on the botched execution of Romell Broom.  The paper entitled its position as “Time for America to move past capital punishment.” In addition to citing the problems with lethal injection, the paper noted the risk of executing the innocent and the U.S.'s increasing isolation on the death penalty in the world.  The editorial continuted, "Even for those who believe that such heinous criminals deserve to die, our society becomes dangerously base if we promote these kinds of deaths.“  Read the entire editorial below.

EDITORIALS: "High Cost of Death Row"

Posted: September 28, 2009
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In an editorial on September 28 in the New York Times, the paper called the death penalty "an economic drain on governments with already badly depleted budgets."  Citing figures from the Death Penalty Information Center, the Times noted that "States waste millions of dollars on winning death penalty verdicts, which require an expensive second trial, new witnesses and long jury selections. Death rows require extra security and maintenance costs." The editors remarked that some states have begun reconsidering whether the death penalty is worth its exorbitant costs, especially since the money spent could be used instead on “police officers, courts, public defenders, legal service agencies and prison cells.” The editorial was discussed on Daily Kos. The entire editorial can be read below: