We're a more civilised society

Take a look at this graph – it shows that Australians now oppose the death penalty by an overwhelming margin.

In a recent Roy Morgan poll, only 23 per cent supported the death penalty for those found guilty of murder, while 64 per cent supported imprisonment. When the question was asked in 1947, some 67 per cent supported the death penalty and 24 per cent imprisonment.

The poll also showed that those who believed in a mandatory life sentence for murder are now outnumbered by those who believe judges should have some discretion in sentencing.

It's cheering data for those of us who believe no society can execute criminals and still call itself civilised.

Back on November 9, 2008, worried by my lack of emotion about Indonesia's executing three of the Bali bombers, I put up a long Grumpy Old Journo post examining my opposition to the death penalty. I've just re-read it, and my views are as firm as ever.

First, the post enumerated rational arguments – for example, that now and again innocent people are judicially murdered in countries which carry out executions – but also the more difficult examination of how we form our moral attitudes.

So it's good to learn that two-thirds of Australians would now agree with me. Last November, I wasn't so sure. I wrote:

I'd assumed the fight against the death penalty had long been won in civilised societies like Australia.
But a bit over a year ago, I was at the monthly meeting of a club for retired business and professional men. Our speaker was a retired police inspector, and when he said he still believed in the death penalty, a murmur of assent went around the room. Out there, support for the death penalty remains, although it's hard to assess how strong it is.

So I thank Scott Steel (Possum Comitatus) for cheering me up by outlining the Roy Morgan data in this Crikey blog post (from which I've lifted the graph). You can read Roy Morgan's own report here.

Those interested in the development of anti-death penalty policies in a civilised nation – Australia – will find this NSW Council of Civil Liberties timeline useful.

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Reflections on the death penalty

The trouble with fighting for human freedom is that one spends most of one's time defending scoundrels. For it is against scoundrels that oppressive laws are first aimed, and oppression must be stopped at the beginning if it is to be stopped at all. – H.L Mencken (US editor and essayist, 1880-1956)


So firing squads have ended the lives of the three Bali murderers.

Why am I not more depressed? Why do I feel so little dismay at their execution? Why am I now disturbed by the thought I may betray beliefs I have held since my teenage years?

The quote which leads this post is not strictly apposite to judicial execution. But its basic premise, that we must not suspend our moral beliefs when the cause becomes unpalatable, is relevant. (I had, in fact, stashed away Mencken's quote in case I ever felt the need to discuss again that despicable turd, David Hicks.)

I'd assumed the fight against the death penalty had long been won in civilised societies like Australia.

But a bit over a year ago, I was at the monthly meeting of a club for retired business and professional men. Our speaker was a retired police inspector, and when he said he still believed in the death penalty, a murmur of assent went around the room. Out there, support for the death penalty remains, although it's hard to assess how strong it is.

But even lifelong opponents of the death penalty may be having trouble arguing against the execution of the Bali murderers. They killed 202 people and maimed hundreds more (and it's understandable that Australians should feel strongly, because 88 of the dead and many of the mutilated were Australians).

The only regret the murderers expressed was that a few Muslims had died in the blasts. The images often showed them smiling, even gloating.

One can make many rational, practical arguments against judicially imposed death penalties. Very occasionally our juries and judges will convict an innocent man – and it's hard to make amends once you've hanged him.

When I was a young journalist on The West Australian, a serial killer terrorised Perth. Eric Edgar Cooke began his crimes in 1958 and continued until police caught him in 1963.

He confessed to more than 200 thefts, five hit-and-run offences against young women, five more attacks on women asleep in their beds. In all, he attacked 22 people and killed eight.

But in his confession, he claimed he'd committed two murders for which other men had been convicted. I remember we used to giggle at how convenient it was – the police wiped several hundred unsolved crimes off their books as they accepted all of his confession. All, that is, except for the two murders where they'd already put men away.

But it really was nothing to laugh about. A deaf-mute man, Daryl Beamish, was already serving a 15-year sentence for the 1959 murder of Jillian Brewer, and John Button was serving five years for the manslaughter of his girlfriend Rosemary Anderson.

Attempts to have their convictions overturned were not helped on October 26, 1964, when the hangman killed a key witness – Eric Edgar Cooke, the last man to be executed in Fremantle Prison.

Beamish served his 15 years, but in 2005 the conviction was quashed after evidence indicated Cooke probably was the killer. Thank God he hadn't been hanged. Similarly, Button's conviction was quashed in 2002.

The WA police and judiciary can take no credit for reversing this gross miscarriage of justice – it was almost solely the work of a Perth journalist, Estelle Blackburn, who was later honoured with the Medal of the Order of Australia and a Walkley Award.

Indeed, as some recent cases have demonstrated, Western Australia appears to be one of the few jurisdictions in which it is still considered acceptable for a crown prosecutor to fail to reveal evidence which may be favorable to the accused.

There are other rational arguments. Here are some: The death penalty doesn't deter crime. The executioners are likely to become brutalised or suffer trauma. If it's vengeance (rather than justifiable punishment), putting men to death must diminish us all.

And the claim that established execution methods – hanging, firing squad, pistol bullet into the brain, lethal injection or gassing, electric shock, guillotine – are quick and relatively painless is, at best, dubious.

Also, if we welcome the Bali murderers' executions, we put ourselves in a weak position to argue against death penalties against Australian drug mules in Indonesia and elsewhere in Asia.

But the issue goes beyond rational argument about the pros and cons of capital punishment. It is, fundamentally, a moral issue. So, as we contemplate our responses to the Bali murderers' executions, it's hard to avoid examining how we form our moral beliefs. Do we have the right to kill, or to endorse the killing, of men in cold blood, even with due judicial process?

For the past few days, I've been out on the motor cycle, touring wonderfully scenic country and finding new roads (I'll tell you about them later). But when I've picked up a paper in a cafe or watched TV news above the bar, I've had to confront my responses to the then-impending executions.

Yesterday morning, I opened The Weekend Australian and noted on Page 4 a longish comment piece by journalist Paul Toohey in which he agonises over the same questions. I empathise with him, although I feel he has trouble isolating the core issue – do we have the moral right to kill criminals in cold blood?

Toohey is a fine journalist, and his perceptive reports have given The Australian's readers a better understanding of issues involving the Federal Government intervention in Northern Territory indigenous communities. But at one stage, he appears to argue that because he cannot stand the sight of blood, and would not be able to pull the trigger or the trapdoor lever himself, the death penalty is wrong.

I think I'm made of sterner stuff. If my conscience persuaded me that a man should die for his crimes, and if absolutely no-one else could be found to do the deed, I could commit the execution. I oppose the death penalty not because I'm squeamish, but because I believe it's morally wrong.

How do we form our moral beliefs? Do we soak up the attitudes of fellow lefties, or on the other side, of conservatives sipping gin and tonics in a gentlemen's club (which may be where some judges reinforce their attitudes)?

Do we pray for guidance in understanding God's will? It doesn't seem to help much. The Christian community ranges from the supporters of departing US President George W. Bush, a devout believer who signed off on many executions as Governor of Texas, to those Christians who have devoted their lives to the abolition of capital punishment.

Perhaps, too, we should remind ourselves: The Bali murderers also believed they were carrying out God's will.

Notes: The crimes of Eric Edgar Cooke form a central element of Robert Drewe's book, The Shark Net, and the case is described well in this Wikipedia article.

Paul Toohey's comment can be read here.

Since this post first went up, the Australian Government, with the support of the Opposition, has announced it will step up an international campaign to abolish capital punishment. Here's the ABC report.

Oh dear, I've uttered a swear word at a Greens Party meeting

A bit over a week ago, I found myself at a Greens Party meeting. And I uttered an obscene word: Realpolitik.

Despite his leftish views, this blogger doesn't usually attend Greens meetings, any more than he joins mobs marching down streets chanting “Waddawe want?” Nice people, and history will show many of their environmental and social justice concerns to have been well founded, but their absolute, unquestioning faith in their credo can be unsettling.

As is their general impotence at advancing their policies in the mainstream of Australian politics.

The invitation had come via our reconciliation group, and it seemed to be for a community meeting to discuss Kevin Andrews's slashing of Australia's intake of Sudanese refugees.

The Immigration Minister's decision disturbed me, especially after he made it clear he had no more than anecdotal evidence about the refugees' propensity to crime and failure to assimilate.

Hullo, I thought, John Howard's playing the xenophobia card but he's getting Andrews to do the deed. Now I think it was all Andrews's work – he's that type of guy.

Anyhow, I'm at what proved to be a Greens meeting and I'm hearing some pretty heavy criticism of Kevin Rudd. It's understandable. The Opposition Leader has repudiated – or failed to endorse – nearly everything dear to the Greens' hearts.

The room is full of good vibes. These few decent, caring people are doing their bit for a better Australia. But there's also a feeling that some would now find it impossible to give Rudd their vote.

Then I pipe up, and utter what, to Greens at least, must be an obscene word. Realpolitik (look it up here, if you wish, or at more length in Wikipedia). I point out that Rudd is tip-toeing through minefields set by one of the most astute and ruthless politicians in our history.

If he speaks out against the way Howard and Mal Brough are going about their “national emergency” intervention in Northern Territory Aboriginal communities, Howard and Brough (and Costello and Abbott and Hockey, and all the rest of them) will howl: “See, he doen't care about the sexual abuse of children.”

If he speaks out against the Gunns mill, he risks a repeat of that astonishing scene three years ago when members of Australia's most bloody-minded union packed a Launceston hall and cheered Howard.

I also point out to all these nice people that if the coming election returns the Howard government, the Prime Minister will take it as an endorsement of all his policies – including the slashing of our intake of African immigration. And the only way to stop that is to elect a Rudd Labor government.

Don't believe the polls, I say. This election is going to be much closer than you think. Rudd will have a hard task winning the necessary 16 extra seats.

The Greens' best chance of more political influence is to increase representation in the Senate, where Labor, even if wins in the House of Representatives and forms government, is unlikely to obtain a clear majority. Labor then will have to woo minority parties like the Greens more assiduously than ever.

But whatever you do, give your preferences to Labor.

Well, I've said it. But I think some of these people have cooled towards me. I've marked myself as an outsider, perhaps even a Labor Party plant, although one pleasant young woman chats with me as I walk back to my motor cycle and pull on my jacket.

A day or two later, I feel vindicated when I see the response to Rob McClelland's statement that a Labor government would campaign globally against the death penalty, even for the Bali bombers. Howard and Costello went on the attack immediately.

They say you need a touch of the mongrel to succeed in Australian politics. Rudd has it in spades. He slammed down his shadow foreign minister, even though McClelland only stated Labor policy, and also blamed the unnamed staffers who had cleared the speech. Now that's realpolitik.

The issue of the death penalty troubles me. My opposition is akin to religious belief, but I can't explain why. I even acknowledge that if you offered suicide pills to prisoners in Asian jails – and even to those in the Goulburn Supermax – more than a few would take them.

I had assumed that most Australians shared my belief. But at a meeting of a retired professional and business men's club the other day, the speaker (a retired detective inspector) said he supported the death penalty, and a murmur of approval went around the room.

Of course, one could say: "Only for the most serious crimes." It's hard to argue on behalf of mass murderers, especially when they're Asian Muslim jihadists and you're talking to Australians.

But to me, this is an issue on which you can't be half-pregnant. Let's be blunt about it. Howard and Costello support the death penalty. And now Rudd too?

--ooOOoo--

Note added 18 October: Yesterday at the National Press Club in Canberra, Greens Leader Bob Brown urged voters to vote first for Greens, but to make their preference votes count. Later, on the ABC's 7.30 Report, he answered questions from Kerry O'Brien.

He said a vote for the Greens offered double value – "you send a message to the next government that you prefer the Greens' strong social and environmental policies, and if the Greens is not elected, then that vote goes over as a whole vote to the next party of your choice. It's double value voting."

Kerry had to drag it out of him, but he managed to get Senator Brown to say:

It's time for Australia to have fresh blood, to have new ideas, to come into the 21st century. John Howard can't do that.

Let's hope Kevin Rudd, who says he's a conservative and therefore will need the Greens in there to make his policies on a whole range of social and environmental issues more progressive [there's something missing from that sentence, but that's the online transcript].

Let's hope, though, we do get a change of Government. That's what democracy's about and it will be good for this country.

Don't shout it from the rooftops – but I might just do as Brown suggests. Vote Greens (1) and then give my prefs to Labor. Try to get Rudd in as PM, with a message that many Australians want a more progressive agenda than he has enunciated, and hope to give the Greens (or the Democrats, God bless 'em) a little more clout in the Senate.

And a second note added on 18 October: You may enjoy Emma Tom's The Wry Side column in this morning's Australian. She makes the same points about capital punishment – including the half-pregnant line – as I have, but she's much more fun to read. [My BigPond connection is creaking along so slowly, I can't get up a web address to give you a link.]