Treason remains the only legally viable excuse to hang. Considering
that the Crown Prosecution Service is unlikely to bring on a case for
treason against any individual, we shall be spared the medieval repeat
of dark retribution. The arguments for hanging someone on the ground of
treason is perhaps twice as heinous to those who would like rapists, murderers and shoplifters persecuted by hanging from the noose - 'let this be a lesson to the odious scumbags!'. Yet the principal argument against hanging is that it does not work as a deterrent
to would be perpetrator of such crimes as treason. There might be
greater powers at play. The terrorist bomber might be driven to one's
destructive state of mind by following alternative philosophies. On a
lesser scale, the rapist, murderer (whether predetermined or accidental)
and shoplifter had never been deterred by even the mere prison term,
fixed penalty and in their day, the ASBO.
The
nature of punishment is that it always takes place after the criminal
act had taken place. E. M Forster rued over how christening, wedding and
funeral always took place after the physical acts of birth, coitus and
death, striking too early or too late to really add any realistic
meaning to the events. Perhaps, Forster, writing in the years before the
Great War was taken in by a spirit where the celebratory nature of such
events for those associated with the individual had not been properly taken into account. I for one would add the greatly emancipating event of graduation to the group of irrelevant events. Getting a 'first' in Philosophy
is itself an achievement and needs no further accolade. Yet the day is
served up on a photographic frame as a permanent reminder on the proud
living room of middle class parents up and down the country. The reader
might argue whether the gravity of getting a first, being born, getting
married or death as acts could ever be compared to committing a crime.
Yet these are all events where the act of working hard, physical
communion on the part of the parents to bring about new life, falling in
love (one shall ignore all the other reasons for getting married) and
death are never really premeditated under reasonable circumstances.
Coitus might well be initiated over a period to conceive, a first might
be studied for, death could be the result of a lifetime of poor
lifestyle choices making the body prone to incurable disease or mere
exhaustion, and a crime can be planned, yet the punishment does not
really dawn on the individual before they are committing the act.
The
principal difference between committing a crime and the other acts is
that the criminal punishment is never celebrated by the one being
punished. Not in the normal criminal circle that is and for the purposes
of this discussion we shall refrain from referencing the masochist. The
other events, christening, wedding, funeral and graduation might well
be. However, christenings and weddings are affairs of hope. It is hoped
that those involved would have a long, joyous and righteous life under
the gaze of a watching creator. The criminal is expected to rot in jail
or be hanged. We need never look back upon their lives as positive
events even if they had been christened, graduated and married. Death,
whether initiated immediately through the direct play of state legal
machinery or a line on page 5 of the Independent is as close to a
ceremony.
Miscarriages of justice is never really a
consideration when the jury or judge is sentencing. The scope of the
legal framework is that it can only examine evidence and the sentence is
delivered based on available evidence. This process is exactly the same
when the criminal is contemplating the act of crime. The ability to get
away with it might play a part but any future punishment after having
been caught is not in mind as the crime is being committed.
Either way, the death penalty is long buried under the ashes of Derek Bentley, Guildford Four, Renault Five and Birmingham Six. The various arguments have lost any semblance of meaning in every quarter but the staunch right wing Daily Mail reader's breakfast table.
Acknowledgement: © TTR