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Ed Peters, Call Your Office!

There has been a dust-up since that editorial against the death penalty co-authored by the editors of the 4 Catholic newspapers. And maybe Bruenig is getting too big for her britches, in other contexts. But the Left is right on this one. Capital punishment has never, and is not now, forbidden in the abstract by the Catholic Church. And since I agree that murderers deserve death, we don't need all this whining from the Catholic Right about their motives being impugned. I trust that your motive is the same as mine: justice. Does the capital punishment system in the United States further justice?

No.

It systemically ignores its own safeguards; it is arbitrarily enforced; it gives political rewards to those who trample on the rights of defendants. It is both agonizingly slow, and not slow enough. The guy in Ohio who waited 39 years to die for a crime he didn't commit can tell you all about it.

There is nothing symbolic about this penalty; if you can't make sure you've got the right person, and that the guilty have every access to capable representation, especially after the verdict, you can't do it. We're not even close to that.

In fact, even a cursory glance at the system reveals that the killing of the innocent is not only possible, but likely. That should trouble everyone. It doesn't, though. It's almost enough to make you question motives.
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