[108213] in Cypherpunks
CDR: Feb. 12 column - death penalty (fwd)
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Jim Choate)
Tue Feb 9 01:08:19 1999
From: Jim Choate <ravage@einstein.ssz.com>
To: cypherpunks@einstein.ssz.com
Date: Mon, 8 Feb 1999 23:53:10 -0600 (CST)
Cc: vinsends@exlink.com, vin@lvrj.com
Reply-To: Jim Choate <ravage@einstein.ssz.com>
Hi,
Since there is no address included for either Tracy Lamourie or Dave
Parkinson please be so kind as to forward this rebuttal to them.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Resent-Date: Mon, 8 Feb 1999 20:21:21 -0700
Date: Mon, 8 Feb 1999 19:22:56 -0800 (PST)
To: vinsends@ezlink.com
From: Vin_Suprynowicz@lvrj.com (Vin Suprynowicz)
Subject: Feb. 12 column - death penalty
Resent-From: vinsends@ezlink.com
Resent-Sender: vinsends-request@ezlink.com
My understanding of the rationale that leads the Libertarian Party in the
U.S. to endorse the death penalty is that any responsible philosophy of
personal liberty must also hold individuals accountable for their own
actions, up to and including the ultimate penalty for ultimate crimes --
the crimes of those who organize death camps, for instance.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Then you agree that individual repesentatives of the state, since they don't
loose their individual rights and responsibilities pursuant to those rights,
also must be held accountable for their actions? Or does the Libertarian
party hold that participation in a democratic system is sufficient to deny
those participants their individual rights? In effect a democratic system is
sufficient justification to abrograte the democratic system itself?
Equating an act of genocide to burglary is bogus. It's like saying kill
people for jay-walking.
To kill a person for setting up a death camp is to become the person setting
up the death camp. Kid yourself not, the death room at your local penal
institution is a death camp (simply calling it Death Row is not sufficient
to hide this fact).
The problem with revenge is identical to that of hate, you become what you
are protecting yourself against. It is fundamentaly self-defeating and
corrupting of ethics and morality in both the individual and social levels.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
Also, if an individual has a natural and moral right to kill in
self-defense (which he most certainly does), then the individual also has
the right to DELEGATE that power.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Right can not be delegated. To do so puts the delegate in direct and
immediate conflict with their own rights. Something fundamentaly in
opposition to democracy (not to mention commen sense). If the Libertarians
believe this then they clearly are not supporters of democracy or individual
rights.
How does one delegate their right to freedom of speech? Of religion? Of
non-self-incrimination? If one can not delegate those rights then one can
not delegate any other rights.
This is a fundamental misunderstanding of what a right is. It is not a
result of social or civil order but of being a living breathing human being.
Rights supercede the duties and responsibilities of society and its members.
To believe in delegation of rights is like believing another person can
breath in your stead. The only bright note I can see in this is that if
we're lucky you'll asphyxiate before you can act on your beliefs.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
For instance, if I have the right to defend my home against assailants
(as I certainly do), and I call the police to inform them that my house is
under attack, the arriving police have a right to kill those assailants if
necessary to protect my life (even though it's not the individual police
officer's home or family that are under attack.)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
The police, as you, only have a right to kill if they are in immediate
danger or see another is so. To extend the right of lethal self-defence to
an arbitrary conflict, say a car accident or simple theft, is contrary to
democratic ideals. Further evidence Libertarians do not support true
democratic goals. If we allow such extension why do we not allow the police
to kill the offender the next day? Or a week later? Or perhaps before they
even commit the crime? If we allow this then the person in your original
example is justified in killing you since you represent a threat to their
life. To justify the killing because it's convenient and expediant doesn't
remove the fact it is murder.
The police officers duty to kill is an extension of their responsibility,
not right - the government and by extension its agents are given no rights
under a democracy and certainly not under ours, to protect the other members
of society. If the ONLY way they can do that is via deadly force it is
justified. If there is any way to avoid this then any act of lethal force is
equivalent to murder and should be treated as such. Expediancy be damned.
Doesn't the forcing of support for the death penaly on persons who do not
believe in it by taxation lend itself to abuse? Is it not a act against my
right to decide when lethal force is required? In the act of expressing your
right you take mine away. Clearly contrary to democratic ideals and further
evidence the Libertarian party is not democratic in nature or goals. It is
in fact a clear statement by the party that it is interested in protecting
only those citizens who share their goals and beliefs. In effect you are
saying "liberty for me but not for thee".
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
This mirrors the moral justification for members of the armed forces
killing attacking enemies.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
To compare the situation of a soldier at war with a civilian police officer
is a misunderstanding of both duties. The duties of a police officer is to
uphold civil order, the duty of a soldier is to destroy civil order. This
is a completely false line of reasoning. The fact that you, and possibly by
extension the Libertarien party, don't understand this distinction is clear
evidence that the rest of your reasoning is suspect.
Soldiers have no right to use deadly force unless an attack is made on their
installations. Or does the Libertarian party endorse the use of military
force in civilian law enforcement?
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Newfoundland? I highly doubt it. Also, many other nations impose the death
penalty with far more profligacy than the United States. Singapore, Iraq,
Iran, and China come quickly to mind.)
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
So how many people does it take to commit a crime until the act isn't a
crime anymore? The "Lemming" approach to justification of actions is
bankrupt. Justice isn't measured in quantity it's measured in principle.
If enough Arab nutcases release bio-weapons does that justify your neighbor
in doing it? If your neighbor rapes your daughter does that justify you
doing likewise?
How many people are you willing to allow to get together to decide whether
you live to see the morrow?
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Now, I see two areas where the above rationale for the death penalty may
fall down: 1) the executioner is not acting in "self-defense"; he may in
fact be exercising a form of vengeance, no matter how sanctified by
statute. While I have a natural right to kill you WHILE you are attacking
my home or family, it does not necessarily follow that (having repelled
your attack and survived my encounter), I have a right to seek you out and
kill you "in cold blood" some months later, at my leisure.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
By rational extension the state can not justify the taking of a human life.
In the fist case, states (a system of rules and procedures) can't be killed.
They're not alive in the first place. Additionaly, a democratic state does
not own it's citizens, therefore any extension that a threat to some number
of those citizens is a threat to the state is false. The state is nothing
more than an agreement. If there is a foreign power threatening the people
of a country it is the people and not the state that are at risk. It is
clear that by the time a state can kill an individual that individual no
longer poses an immediate threat to anyone, as a consequence the
justification of that death is false. Also, since rights can't be delegated,
and certainly can't be delegated to a non-living entity it is false reasoning
to hold that the state is in any way protecting either itself or its citizens.
What the death penalty is in reality is the modern equivalent of an eye for an
eye. From a Constitutional perspective life is a fundamental private property.
The Constitution prohibits the taking of private property withou recompense to
the owner, no exceptions or considerations or made as to how that person came
to own that property. How much is your life worth on the open market? The
Constitution clearly uses the word 'private' and 'personal' in this regards.
The argument that the Constitution does not hold the concept of privacy is
false.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
This point is worth some further debate. I and my neighbors may indeed
have some right to sortie forth and "clean out" a nest of bandits if they
have demonstrated a pattern of aggression against my community. The problem
here is how to avoid the mere assertion that anyone with sufficient power
or stealth has "the right" to kill anyone he thinks "might eventually be a
danger to him."
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Does the phrase "clear and present danger" ring any bells? If one can
justify killing another because they might eventualy be a danger has in fact
provided all the justification needed for another to kill them in
self-defence since they have clearly demonstrated a proclivity for deadly
violence by their own hand. In a democracy one only punishes people for what
they have done, NEVER for what they might do. Additionaly, it mediates that
punishment with the understanding that they could be in error and if found
to be so are required by ethics and democratic ideals to recompense the
abused. How does one recompense the taken of their life? Can the state give
it back? It is clear that in a democratic system the state has no right to
any resource that it can not return if found to possess it in error or use
it irresponsibly. The fact that a single innocent person ever dies via the
states death penalty laws is sufficient reason to eliminate those same death
penalty laws.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
2) The government just does such a damnably bad job of enforcing any
current death penalty justly or equitably. Its purported effect as a
warning is reduced almost to nil by the fact that modern execution is not
quick; neither is it public; nor is it certain. And statistically, your
chance of actually being executed is enormously higher (for similar crimes)
if you are poor, and/or black, Indian, or Hispanic.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
If one has a right, as you claim, whether they express it well or poorly is
irrelevant. You can't take the right of speech away because somebody speaks
poorly or perhaps says something you disagree with. Do mutes have the right
to free speech? Or perhaps again, we're seeing the true color of the
Libertarian character.
If the government would cease involvment in consensual crimes the need for
the vast majority of death penalties wouldn't be needed in the first place.
The death penalty is a direct result of the unethical and over-broad, not
to mention unconstitutional, duties that the government has taken upon
itself and the corruption of the democratic ideals of our Constitution.
In addition, how does the government pay for its mistakes? In the last 25
years 75 people have been released from death row because evidence proved
their innocence. How many others didn't get that lucky? How does one justify
pre-meditated murder by accident? Don't these people have a right to
self-defence, their lives were clearly in danger of loss? How should they
express that right to self-defence? Shouldn't that police officer who you
called to protect your house with deadly force have the same ethical calling
to protect their lives with deadly force? Does this not clearly lead to a
direct and immediate contradiction of duty for all concerned? This
contradiction is a clear indicator of faulty logic.
How can the state take a right away when in fact it is not its to give in
the first place. Rings suspicously close to your burglary example above.
If we accept your reasoning of lethal force there then we are forced to
accept the use of force against the state because of their clear and present
danger to use lethal force in the process of taking property that is not
theirs in the first place. Or does the Libertarian party hold that an
individual right to own property is an extension of the state? Again, this is
clearly contradictory and more evidence that Libertarian ideals are not
democratic ideals.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
It is this last reason -- as well as the undeniable fact that our justice
system is so imperfect as to demonstrably condemn at least several innocent
men to death each year -- which has led me to question and finally reject
(sufficient that I earnestly seek and propose alternatives, like lifetime
exile after tattooing) the death penalty, PERSONALLY.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
To hold a belief personaly and yet support, and actively participate in a
group acting contrary to that belief, is the height of hypocrisy. It's like
saying you have nothing against Jews as you slam the door shut on the gas
chamber because it's your job. Evidence that you are in fact either a very
confused individual who should be ignored or else more than slightly
psychotic (and by your own reasoning a threat which needs to be taken care
of).
Yes, our justice system is imperfect. One of the most heinous imperfections
is the death penalty because innocent people die. By your own reasoning that
duty should be removed from it since it can't carry it out responsibly. You
don't buy your kid a hot-rod the day after they crash your work car (or
perhaps YOU do, my kid would be walking for a LONG time).
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Therefore, I am usually careful to note that the Libertarian Party holds
the death penalty to be proper IN PRINCIPLE, and that I agree in principle,
but that real-life experience IN PRACTICE is simply so inequitable that I
myself now reject the death penalty as currently imposed by the state.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
So, in fact you are admitting to being a hypocrite and willing to slam the
door on the gas chamber. If the system could be implimented perfectly there
wouldn't be a need to have a death penalty in the first place. So you, and
by extension the Liberatarian party, are left with no justification for the
current death penalty or your support for it.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
[text deleted]
This is not to say that I reject the right of the individual to maim or
kill anyone who attacks his home, family or person, so long as the person
being attacked is not doing harm to anyone else such as to justify the
initiation of force against him. The individual does have the right to thus
use deadly force in self-defense, even if the assailant happens to be
wearing some kind of badge or uniform.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
You have no right to maim or kill another, your right is to protect your
life and property; it is recognized that in come cases it is necessary to
kill the other in order to save oneself. That you and the Liberatarian Party
extend this right to retribution and vengeance indicate a considerable threat
to society from you and it.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
[text deleted]
Therefore your question, "How is that you can call yourself a libertarian
and yet allow the government the right to kill its own citizens," seems
somewhat inappropriate. Given that I expressly DIFFER from the LP national
platform in this regard, it might be more appropriate to ask, "How is that
you can call yourself a Libertarian and yet NOT allow the government the
right to kill its own citizens" ... except, of course, that the states and
their courts rarely seek out my permission before throwing the switch.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
No, the question is why when you clearly admit to being a hypocrite does
anyone bother to listen to you in the first place.
Citizenship does not derive from the authority of the state, rather the state
derives from the authority of the citizens. There is a reason citizenship is
obtained at birth and not through some state system (though this apparently
would be news to the Libertarians).
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Men die. Men sometimes have a right to kill. There are higher values than
life. Given the choice between consigning my child to a life of slavery, or
giving up my own life, I devoutly hope I would always choose the latter.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
There is no higher value than life, liberty, and the pursuite of happiness.
A clear indication that neither you or the Libertarian party are worthy of
any self-respecting democraticly minded citizens time and effort in support.
In fact the difference between the Aryan Nation and the Libertarian Party is
nil, you're just better at using euphamism than they are.
By your use of devout I take it you are religous. If you're a Christian then
under no cirucmstances, even self-defence, can you justify the use of deadly
force. The law is "Thou shall not kill", not "Thou shall not kill unless
it's convenient or your life is in danger". Further evidence of either
confusion or hypocrisy. (And no, I'm not a Christain)
In reference to your child example, the fact that you would by rule of law
force your beliefs on others is even further evidence of your hypocrisy.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
And I know I would kill to avoid slavery for me or mine.
Wouldn't you?
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
To place somebody behind bars with the express intent of killing them is the
epitome of slavery. Slavery is the treating of human beings as if they were
inanimate objects and property.
How do you like supporting slavery?
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
[text deleted]
Anyone who believes supporting the Libertarian party is anything other than
exchanging the current shackles for another set is grossly confused. The
Libertarian party is no different than our current abusers, they just wear
a different cut of suit.
____________________________________________________________________
There is a coherent plan in the universe, though
I don't know what it's a plan for.
Fred Hoyle
The Armadillo Group ,::////;::-. James Choate
Austin, Tx /:'///// ``::>/|/ ravage@ssz.com
www.ssz.com .', |||| `/( e\ 512-451-7087
-====~~mm-'`-```-mm --'-
--------------------------------------------------------------------
