Who Is Putting Lives on the Line?

Until recently conservatives had strong views on crime (it should be punished). They dug in their heels around the death penalty as the ultimate vindication of the law and the social order that created that law. If an eye-for-an eye was good enough for God, it was good enough for most Republicans.

Liberals traditionally took a relative view of crime, considering all the environmental issues that twisted a person toward crime. The major implication: most criminals are merely conforming to what society expects of them. So you see, in certain relativistic, liberal perspective, most criminals became victims. The bleeding hearts wondered how such victimization could be undone. They sought therapeutic closure over swift, definitive punishment. They even wondered by what authority they could derive this godlike power to tinker with a criminal's life.

That was in a simpler time, when the battle lines were clearly drawn. Nowadays, the pendulum swings. First, outgoing Illinois Governor George Ryan suspended the use of the death penalty. Now others are joining him in the call to eliminate capitol punishment. The Maryland General Assembly is debating a bill that would outlaw the practice. Alarming evidence that innocent people are being sent to death row buoys their call.

In their book, "Actual Innocence," superlawyers Barry Scheck, Peter Neufeld and Jim Dwyer tell the story of ten men who were wrongly convicted. Backed by advances in DNA testing, the book implies that countless other wrongfully convicted prisoners are languishing in jail, some on death row. The book offers compelling evidence of police negligence, while noting that blacks and the poor are given the death penalty in disproportionate numbers.

Needless to say, the reaction among conservatives has been panic. Prominent conservatives George W. Will and Pat Robertson have led a call for a moratorium on the death penalty. They believe that if prejudice and ineptitude corrupt the legal system, the death penalty will no longer serve to maintain the social order.

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