The Trump administration is ratcheting up the pace of federal executions prior to his leaving office. Having resumed executions in 2019 for federal crimes, there have been 13 executions since last July. His administration resumed putting inmates to death after a 17-year hiatus. This will cement Trump’s legacy as the most prolific execution president in over 130 years. While President Obama had placed a moratorium on federal executions, he left the door open for future presidents to resume them. It is reported that Attorney General William Barr defended the extension of executions into the post-election period, saying he’ll likely schedule more before he departs the Justice Department.
It should be remembered that the U.S. is the only Western industrialized country to continue to have the death penalty. The death penalty was ‘de facto’ abolished in Canada in 1963 and ‘de jure’ by legislation in 1999. An Angus Reid survey in 2012 indicated that fifty percent of Canadian respondents said they prefer life imprisonment without the possibility of parole while only 38 percent supported the death penalty. Interestingly, according to the same survey, 88 percent of respondents who voted Conservative in the 2011 federal election were more likely to regard the death penalty as appropriate — much in line with their Republican counterparts in the U.S.
At last count, President-elect Joe Biden is a death penalty foe, and a spokesman told the American Press that Biden would work to end the death penalty for federal crimes once he is in office next January. However, this still currently leaves the death penalty as a legal capital punishment in 28 American states. Last year, those states carried out a combined 22 executions. However, most states halted executions since the start of the pandemic as a safety measure in prisons.
Another concern for the federal government and the affected states is the current shortage of the lethal drug used to carry out the sentences, much of it previously imported from Europe. For this reason, the U.S. Justice Department was forced recently to update protocols to allow for federal executions by firing squad and poison gas, though it’s unclear if those methods might be used in coming weeks. Some states also have the option of hanging in carrying out their sentences. All of which are barbaric! One wonders if they intend to bring back the guillotine, once used by a number of European countries but since abolished with removal of the death penalty?
It will be interesting to see whether the Biden administration will live up to its intention to do away with the death penalty for federal crimes, despite the current Republican-led Senate. Hopefully, if Biden follows through, states with capital punishment may consider putting an end to their death penalty option and thus becoming part of the more humane and civilized world. In addition, Canada has seen a number of prisoners who have been found innocent after serving a number of years as a result of life sentences. As history shows, abolishing the death penalty would also put an end to the tragic execution of persons found innocent after the fact.
FROLITICKS 