The Chicago Tribune, reversing its long-held opinion, has come out against the death penalty:
We have learned much, particularly with advances in DNA technology, about the criminal justice system's capacity to make terrible mistakes. These revelations--many stemming from investigations by this newspaper--shake the foundation of support for capital punishment.
Who gets a sentence of life and who gets death is often a matter of random luck, of politics, of geography, even a matter of racism. Mistakes can occur at every level of the process.
[. . .]
The system is arbitrary, and the system just plain gets it wrong. In the three decades since the death penalty was reinstated in the U.S., more than 120 people have been released from Death Row after evidence was presented that undermined the case against them. In that time Illinois has executed 12 people--and freed 18 from Death Row.
[. . .]
The evidence of mistakes, the evidence of arbitrary decisions, the sobering knowledge that government can't provide certainty that the innocent will not be put to death--all that prompts this call for an end to capital punishment. It is time to stop killing in the people's name.
The Tribune has identified the best reason to question the death penalty -- it's an awesome power to give the government, and mistakes the government makes in whom it executes can't be undone. But the very reason it cites in changing its mind -- new and better evidentiary techniques -- is the same reason mistakes are less likely to be made.
Though we will never get to zero mistakes, we will get closer and closer. How close is close enough? William Blackstone said it is better that ten guilty persons escape than that one innocent suffer. In substituting life without parole for the death penalty, those 10 would not escape -- they would just suffer less -- and the innocent would still be around if their innocence is discovered. Pretty strong argument.
(Via The Indiana Law Blog)
