General Discussion
In reply to the discussion: Are you glad that John Brown was hanged? [View all]Martin Eden
(12,863 posts)It took me a long time to get there. At one time I thought execution was justified for murder beyond reasonable doubt. Then I started to oppose the death penalty because of wrongful convictions and because justice is not applied equally for the poor (and especially for poor minorities).
But there is a big difference between opposition to the death penalty based on the vagaries of the justice system -- versus opposition based on the moral conviction that I have no right to take someone's life as punishment for a crime, regardless of how heinous the offense.
I deliberately wrote that I have no right (rather than the state has no right) because I am a firm believer in the principle that We The People ARE The State. Whatever our government does in the enforcement of our laws is done at our behest and in OUR NAME. We must, of course, through our courts pass judgement and impose sentences for crimes, but passing the judgement that another human being be put to death is a threshold I'm no longer willing to cross.
In the case of John Brown it should be noted that he made the decision to kill other human beings. If you think less of a person for deliberately taking someone's life, that should lessen whatever reverence one might have for John Brown.