Balancing death
On March 12, Tracy Lee Housel was executed for murder, and his execution has raised questions about the use of the death penalty.
Housel, a dual British and American citizen, was convicted of the rape and murder of Jean Drew in 1985. His sentence was carried out in Georgia bringing an outcry from Great Britain, which has not practiced the death penalty for 29 years.
“We are philosophically opposed to the death penalty,” said Peter Reid, public relations officer for the British Embassy in Washington, D.C. “We’ve been opposed to the death penalty always and will continue to be.”
According to the British Public Records Office Web site, www.pro.gov.uk/inthenews/capital-pun/capi-1.html, the British government abolished the practice completely with the Northern Ireland (Emergency Powers) Act in 1973.
Reid said the British government had sought to have Housel’s sentence commuted to a life sentence instead of the death penalty.
“It’s our policy that we are opposed [to the death penalty] and will continue to make a stand against it,” he said.
Reid said the opposition was not against the crime, just the punishment.
“We deplore [the crimes] as much as the next,” he said. “We are disagreeing with policy not with crimes.”
Even though the execution was carried out, the British and U.S. governments have not felt tension, Reid said. Because of the relationship between the countries, he said it was possible for the two to differ over some points and still remain on good terms with each other.
Anthony Peacock, a political science professor, said, “It’s basically just a difference in opinion.”
Though the British government does not practice capital punishment, it would procedurally be impossible for the government to protect dual citizens against a host of crimes committed in this country, Peacock said.
“Unless you have diplomatic immunity, you are going to be subject to the law,” he said.
Neil Wieloch, a sociology professor, said the issue of the death penalty in the United Sates has been under constant scrutiny for years. When it was first introduced, the practice was used as a deterrent for crimes. Over time the practice was confined to prisons and no longer a public event.
“Why is the U.S. the only Western democracy to carry out executions – that is a very good question,” Wieloch said. Of the 50 states, only 18 have not executed a prisoner since 1977, according to web.cis.smu.edu/~deathpen/execyrst1.html.
The practice was abolished in 1972 when the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in the Furman v. Georgia case, calling the death penalty unconstitutional and in violation of the Eighth Amendment’s protection against cruel and unusual punishment, according to the Department of State International Information Programs at www.usinfo.state.gov.
However, in 1976, many states had rewritten death penalty statutes to meet court stipulations. With Gregg v. Georgia, the Supreme Court upheld the constitutionality of the imposition of capital punishment for first degree murder in several Southern states. With these decisions combined, the practice was reinstated across the country.
The Crime Library Web site, www.crimelibrary.com/serial10/gilmore, gives the account of Gary Gilmore, the first person to be executed after the practice was brought back. He was executed for multiple murders in Utah in January, 1977.
Though Utah practices the death penalty, Texas leads the nation in the number of executions with about half of the total number, Wieloch said.
In the late 1960s public support for the practice was 42 percent, he said. Support has fluctuated over the years, but the practice remains.
“It seems like it is more a part of history than logic. It doesn’t make sense why we have it,” Wieloch said. “I think it would be hard as a nation to get rid of it.”
As the only Western country to practice the form of punishment, he said there are distinct reasons why Housel’s death could cause an outcry.
“There are definite cultural differences in how the British police their citizens,” he said.
This includes the way their police force and their justice system works.
In the case of Housel, he said, “He was technically a United States citizen – the logic of the law is that the law should be applied to him as it should to any other citizen.”