Lutheran Public Policy Office: Board opposes death penalty

By the Rev. Dr. Eugene Wiegman, board member

The legislature is considering two companion bills (HB 1921 and SB 5456) that will eliminate the death penalty in Washington. The board of the Lutheran Public Policy of Washington has studied both sides of this argument through research and the ELCA’s commitment of justice. The death penalty is controversial with Christians and individual members of ELCA coming down on both sides of this social issue.

Let’s look at some of the key facts and highly regarded opinions. Most European countries do not have the death penalty. In our country, 35 states have the death penalty, 15 do not. Geography and race play pivotal roles. The South accounts for approximately 80 percent of all U.S. executions. In 
96 percent of the states where there have been reviews of race and the death penalty, there was a pattern of either race-of-victim or race-of-defendant discrimination, or both. According to a survey of the former and present presidents of the country’s top academic criminological societies, 88 percent of these experts rejected the notion that the death penalty acts as a deterrent to murder (Radelet & Lacock, 2009). In fact, the Northeast, which accounts for only 1percent of all executions in the U.S., also boasts the lowest murder rate – 3.8 per 100,000 population. Correlation or coincidence?

Despite attempts to provide legal safeguards, the death penalty has not been equally carried out. In Washington, Gary Ridgeway, who confessed to murdering 49 young women, plea-bargained for life imprisonment in place of the death penalty. Since 1973, more than 130 people have been released from death row with evidence of their innocence.

Because of the ELCA commitment to justice for all, efforts should be directed to areas of racism, poverty, abuse and chemical dependency. In America, executions have done nothing to restore a fractured society. It is because of the church’s commitment to justice, we the LPPO’s board, oppose the death penalty.