"Lex est ratio summa; Law is the perfection of reason"
Those words from Sir Edward Coke come to mind when considering the recent batch of editorials and letters to the editor regarding Taiwan's death penalty (Sept. 24, 27 and Oct 1, Page 8). "Discussions" of the death penalty here in Taiwan, as well as in the US, usually devolve into emotionalism and irrationality. Hence my use of the word "discussions" in quotation marks.
Reason, legitimate socio-political policy and a consideration of the relationship between the means and the ends quickly fall by the wayside. Sir Edward is right; law should be based on reason. The death penalty is not.
It is important to realize that the arguments in support of the death penalty are based on emotion, usually of the most primitive kind: fear, vengeance, revenge, a feeling that there are two kinds of people in the world, "us and them."
The death penalty is an issue that is long on emotionalism and short on reason. It has been my experience as both a prosecutor and defense counsel that supporters of the death penalty are often quite flippant towards it. They tend both to trivialize and sensationalize the issue.
The stock defense of death penalty advocates is to bring forth some horrible murder, some despicable murderer and then broadly and loudly proclaim: "an eye for an eye; horrible murderers deserve horrible death." Sometimes, to add emotional fuel to the flames they conjure forth some basically unrelated issue such as race or nationalism in support of the death penalty.
People who use this "line of reasoning" often have no real idea what they are talking about. They generally have never seen a murder scene, never seen an execution, never dealt face to face with crime, with crime victims or murder defendants. What they know about crime, about criminals, they get from movies, TV shows or the sound bite from the talking head on the nightly news. As my dad used to point out, movies ain't real.
I would add that the nightly news is generally not a good source of information either. The New York Times recently conducted a study of the death penalty in the US. The report has two lessons that Taiwan would do well to heed. First it supported the fact that there is absolutely no relationship between violent crime rates and the presence or absence of the death penalty.
The article (New York Times, Sept 22nd) said: " The dozen states that have chosen not to enact the death penalty since the Supreme Court ruled in 1976 that it was constitutionally permissible have not had higher homicide rates than states with the death penalty, government statistics and a new survey by The New York Times show."
Indeed, 10 of the 12 states without capital punishment have homicide rates below the national average, Federal Bureau of Investigation data shows, while half the states with the death penalty have homicide rates above the national average. In a state-by-state analysis, The Times found that during the last 20 years, the homicide rate in states with the death penalty has been 48 to 101 percent higher than in states without the death penalty."
The paper's study also pointed out that many within the US criminal justice system, who are in a position to be able to place the death penalty in a rational context, are opposed to it. A good example is E. Michael McCann, the District Attorney for Milwaukee County, Minnesota. McCann opposes executions even after prosecuting Jeffrey L. Dahmer. Dahmer was an infamous serial killer who murdered and dismembered at least 17 boys and men, and ate flesh from at least one of his victims.
McCann was quoted in the New York Times piece as saying "To participate in the killing of another human being, it diminishes the respect for life. Period." McCann added, "Although I am a district attorney, I have a gut suspicion of the state wielding the power of the death over anybody."
I very much agree with McCann and the people of Taiwan should consider his position carefully.
Fu Jen University is to be commended on sponsoring a study on the death penalty in Taiwan along with the conference they will host on the issue next year. It is time to inject reason and facts into a debate that usually is swept away by emotion and ignorance.
Brian Kennedy is a member of the Board of Amnesty International Taiwan and of the Taiwan Association for Human Rights.
Two sets of economic data released last week by the Directorate-General of Budget, Accounting and Statistics (DGBAS) have drawn mixed reactions from the public: One on the nation’s economic performance in the first quarter of the year and the other on Taiwan’s household wealth distribution in 2021. GDP growth for the first quarter was faster than expected, at 6.51 percent year-on-year, an acceleration from the previous quarter’s 4.93 percent and higher than the agency’s February estimate of 5.92 percent. It was also the highest growth since the second quarter of 2021, when the economy expanded 8.07 percent, DGBAS data showed. The growth
In the intricate ballet of geopolitics, names signify more than mere identification: They embody history, culture and sovereignty. The recent decision by China to refer to Arunachal Pradesh as “Tsang Nan” or South Tibet, and to rename Tibet as “Xizang,” is a strategic move that extends beyond cartography into the realm of diplomatic signaling. This op-ed explores the implications of these actions and India’s potential response. Names are potent symbols in international relations, encapsulating the essence of a nation’s stance on territorial disputes. China’s choice to rename regions within Indian territory is not merely a linguistic exercise, but a symbolic assertion
More than seven months into the armed conflict in Gaza, the International Court of Justice ordered Israel to take “immediate and effective measures” to protect Palestinians in Gaza from the risk of genocide following a case brought by South Africa regarding Israel’s breaches of the 1948 Genocide Convention. The international community, including Amnesty International, called for an immediate ceasefire by all parties to prevent further loss of civilian lives and to ensure access to life-saving aid. Several protests have been organized around the world, including at the University of California Los Angeles (UCLA) and many other universities in the US.
Every day since Oct. 7 last year, the world has watched an unprecedented wave of violence rain down on Israel and the occupied Palestinian Territories — more than 200 days of constant suffering and death in Gaza with just a seven-day pause. Many of us in the American expatriate community in Taiwan have been watching this tragedy unfold in horror. We know we are implicated with every US-made “dumb” bomb dropped on a civilian target and by the diplomatic cover our government gives to the Israeli government, which has only gotten more extreme with such impunity. Meantime, multicultural coalitions of US