The Supreme Court Chooses Who Dies

Last week, the Supreme Court gave one of its more controversial rulings in a while. The case, Bucklew v. Precythe, has been making rounds around the anti-death plenty crowd.

In 1996, Russell Bucklew was convicted of the murder of his ex-girlfriend and her new family, causing him to be placed on death row. Just before he was about to be killed by the state, he filed a law suit calming that — due to the pain which would be caused through a medical condition making a lethal injection especially painful — it violated his 8th amendment right from cruel and unusual punishment. On 4/1/2019, the Supreme Court ruled 5–4 against Bucklew.

I’m mixed on this case, on one hand I agree with Justice Gorsuch that the 8th amendment does not promise you a painless death. However, I also feel that making such an idea a judicial president is worrying to say the least, if only because that president is highly dangerous. I feel the best of the arguments Justice Gorsuch made is related to how many other ways capital punishment can be done — a point Justice Roberts also agreed with and expressed high amount of confusion over — meaning this whole thing could have been averted if they used a method other than lethal injection.

At the same time, the liberal side of the court led by Justice Breyer dropped the ball greatly. Breyer’s main argument is that this specific condition makes his death “cruel and unusual.” This makes no sense. At the end of the day, the result is the same, a person dies.

Here’s the question we should be asking about this case: Can any form of punishment be considered “cruel and unusual,” when death is on the table? How can a society condemn the brutal Chinese torture under Mao when it allows the death of a citizen to be used as punishment on a federal level?

Of course, Justice Gorsuch’s view on death is inconsistent. In 2009, the Judge wrote a book called The Future of Assisted Suicide and Euthanasia. Here is the first paragraph of the Amazon description:

The Future of Assisted Suicide and Euthanasia provides the most thorough overview of the ethical and legal issues raised by assisted suicide and euthanasia — as well as the most comprehensive argument against their legalization — ever published.

So Justice Gorsuch has no issue with the State killing people, but he has a giant issue with you deciding to end your own life. How small government of him.

Here’s what should be the bottom line case against capital punishment: 4% of the people we use it on are innocent. Already, the amount of innocent people we have going to prison is unacceptable, however, putting someone to death over a crime they did not commit is downright evil.

For that matter, the fact that the government even has the power to kill anyone is in of itself authoritarian. Considering governments such as the monarchy of Saudi Arabia has sent people to death over homosexuality, a move recently adopted by the government of Brunei.

Notice, authoritarianism is only bad when someone else does it.

Twitter: @EphromJosine1