On Capital Punishment

The endless controversies to which murder statistics have given prominence, is sufficient testimony to their inconclusiveness. Some States, having abolished the death penalty on such inconclusive evidence, have re-imposed it. There are too many fluctuating social phases, i.e., two world wars, the prohibition era in America, decline of morals etc. The only sure ground is our conscious experience of the part played by fear of death in our lives, and in the lives of others. There is no question of a hunch on my part as Mr. Hollis suggests. As I remarked, "numbers unknown". Moreover, there is the question of retributive aspect in the death penalty. Nothing less can satisfy the disturbed balance of justice in an outraged society. "The righteousness of retributive justice is almost instinctively admitted by every reasonable person. When misdeeds entail no suffering for the offender. when crimes pass unpunished, there arises in every human soul the irresistible convinction that something is lacking, something wrong in the arrangement of the universe " (Dr. P. J. Arendzen in " The teachings of the Catholic Church", p. 1176). St. Paul said to Governor Festus: "If I have committed anything worthy of death, I refuse not to die ". (Acts 25. V. ii.) The phrase " worthy of death" excludes by reasonable inference any consideration of statistics. The murderer deserves death irrespective of whether his crime is shared by few or by many.

Michael O'Halloran 22 Brighton Square, Rathgar, Dublin.

S IR,-One often wonders why Catholics always seem to tend to support the least merciful and enlightened way when it is a question of choice between traditions of the past and enlightenment of today.

That retribution is a vital element of all punishment is surely obvious. If there were none, it is hard to see by what right man could punish either schoolboys Or criminals. Is there no element of retribution in prison sentences? But when it comes to capital punishment. the question is not one of retribution or no retribution. It is a question whether the retribution is or is not the better thing for the criminal or the society. If statistics show that the community loses nothing in countries where capital punishment has been abolished, on what grounds do we support capital punishment? Revenge. compensation for our outraged feelings, an eye for an eye? At any rate let us not pretend that the ten or twenty years' sentence has no element of rctribution in it.

Observer