The gay marriage ban deserves all the attention it has received this election season, but it has largely overshadowed another important issue on the ballot: the death penalty referendum.
Though this is just a referendum, and therefore the outcome will not change the law, it will ""advise members of the Legislature."" More importantly, the outcome of this referendum will reflect the attitudes of Wisconsinites.
Currently in Wisconsin, the strongest penalty for first-degree intentional homicide is life in prison without parole. A ""yes"" vote would support enacting the death penalty for first-degree intentional homicide. Though our first instinct may be to give murderers what they deserve, instincts are the last thing we should be following when judging this matter.
A vote against this referendum on Nov. 7 will prove Wisconsinites to be thoughtful and fair in the face of a nuanced issue.
Capital punishment is an emotional issue, and even those who feel it is cruel and unusual easily can understand the position of those in favor of it. Murderers incite rage and disgust. If a loved one was killed, our grief and anguish would force us to want the murderer to be put to death.
But crucial decisions of life and death should not be motivated by grief, rage or despair. As UW-Madison political science professor Donald Downs said, ""Anger is appropriately part of moral judgment, but we have to be careful with it because it is also linked to our aggressive instincts.""
It is this anger that makes us want revenge, and understandably so. But punishing killing with killing is not only hypocritical but creates ambiguities in the law. When a person kills a child molester, that person is still prosecuted, despite the fact that disgust and moral anger motivated the murder.
Yet capital punishment follows the same principles, declaring a murderer so morally repugnant that he deserves to die. But this is considered justice, not a crime.
We often want murderers to feel the grief and pain that they caused and hope that being sentenced to death will produce remorse. However, many killers are not capable of feeling those emotions, and they will not experience the remorse we hope for.
Furthermore, spending life in prison may in fact be a harsher punishment than a fairly painless, quick death. Given the choice, many would rather face death than a terrible life in prison without the hope of parole.
The issue of capital punishment is made even more complicated by the fact that the innocent or insane might accidentally be put to death. Moreover, putting a person to death may cause just as much grief for the family of the murderer as the original killing or killings caused.
Even in a perfect justice system, the death penalty would still be a morally ambiguous issue. However, our justice system is far from perfect. Downs said, ""The system does not provide sufficient due process for defendants, so we cannot rely on the validity of verdicts in too many cases,"" adding, ""There is gender and racial discrimination in its application.""
As a solution, Downs suggests that the government should ""create a death penalty bar, so only qualified, motivated defense lawyers can work in such cases.""
This referendum may merely be a maneuver by Republicans to win votes. Downs said he agrees: ""Republicans want to take advantage of [the issue of the death penalty] to increase conservative turnout."" Reversing a law that concerns life and death and has been in place for over 150 years should not come down to a mere political ploy.
Wisconsin was the first state to do away with the death penalty in 1853, and on Nov. 7, we should continue to uphold this tradition. If nothing else, it is better to err on the side of letting too many people live than putting too many to death.
