How will South Carolina be known? For its beaches and businesses, or its executions?
South Carolinians love to read reports about how we have some of the best beaches in the world. We also take pride in the Lowcountry when it gets worldwide publicity each April for the RBC Heritage golf classic. Businesses and the Chamber of Commerce tout our communities, like Hilton Head, for the lifestyle we all enjoy — a wonderful and affordable way of life, especially for our senior citizens. All of these are good for our state, its economy and its standing in the nation and world.
Now we have another example of notoriety that affects our state’s reputation. South Carolina is among a few states whose legislature has voted to legalize firing squads for inmates who receive the death penalty. Further, we have reinstated death by electrocution because we supposedly cannot get the legal cocktail of drugs to kill death row inmates by injection.
On one hand our legislature can quickly give the governor what he wants in killing inmates, but when it comes to protecting all citizens of South Carolina, the state Senate still can’t pass the hate crimes bill.
Advocates claim that firing squads will give families closure as they mourn loved ones, and one can respect the indescribable agony these families endure from witnessing and coping with a violent death. Yet, this isn’t just about soothing their suffering. It’s bigger than that. Is bringing back firing squads and electric chairs moral and good public policy? Forget whether they’re legal. This is about the morality of capital punishment and the methods used to kill death row inmates.
What does the Bible say?
The Bible has many examples of crimes for which Biblical law proscribed the death penalty. In addition the Bible gives various methods for execution, including stoning, hanging, and strangling and burning the corpses. In the Talmud, however, rabbis rarely instituted the killing of a convicted criminal. From about the second to the the seventh century of the Common Era, rabbis established that executions should resemble the taking of life by God. That meant that in judicial executions, the body was not to be destroyed or mutilated. In addition, based upon Leviticus 19:17, “you shall love your neighbor as yourself,” loving the accused meant giving them the most humane death possible. Still, throughout Jewish history, actual executions were rare.
Reasonable people can legitimately disagree about capital punishment, but method of execution is an entirely different discussion. I have never had a loved one be the victim of a violent crime. Nor have I witnessed an execution. I have known people who have murdered their loved ones, and I have sat with families who suffered through the shock, anger and outrage of such crimes.
Is death by firing squad a humane way of ending a person’s life no matter what the crime was? Those who murder violate the sanctity of human life, but should government impose an execution that is not that much different from the crime committed?
The United States has plenty of cases in which the electric chair and lethal injection malfunctioned. Firing squads will likely be effective, but at what cost to the integrity of our society and to the values we lay claim to as a Judaeo-Christian nation?
What image do we want South Carolina to be known for? The state that celebrates its economic vitality with the best beaches in the world, great universities and corporations, and a world-renowned golf tournament? Or the state that deploys firing squads to kill people on death row?
South Carolina’s legislators claim that they want to ease the suffering of families whose loved ones were victims of murder. Then how about passing a hate crimes bill to ease the suffering of those who continue to be victims of violent crimes?
Our elected representatives need to think about their priorities — and their humanity — as they pick and choose whose suffering deserves equal protection under the law.
This story was originally published May 14, 2021 at 4:45 AM.