It's looking more and more like Texas executed an innocent man. And that Governor Rick Perry, who just removed a fourth member of the Texas commission responsible for investigating the case, is doing his best to cover up the mistakes. Perry's motives are obvious: the governor denied a three-day reprieve to give the court time to review a report arguing Cameron Todd Willingham's innocence. That has Coates thinking:
The death penalty promotes our sense of order--it offers assurance that those who savagely violate our most cherished morals will be harshly penalized. The question, for me, is what will we tolerate to preserve that assurance? What I hope will come out of this case is a more honest debate about the death penalty. I strongly suspect that Rick Perry--at this point--knows that something went badly wrong in Willingham's execution, and yet still believes in the death penalty. What I hope will emerge is death penalty advocates honest enough to admit that no system of state-sponsored execution can be infallible, because people are fallible. I want them to come out and say what's clear--innocent people will be executed. I want them to stop treating us like children, and make the argument.
I've always come across a different attitude when talking to death penalty fans. The response is typically one of indifference when the issue of innocence is raised, as though the collateral damage of a few lost lives is a necessary trade-off when delivering government-approved, Bible-endorsed justice. It's always been interesting that conservatives remain largely hostile to government but trusting when a death sentence is in the balance. Perhaps the high profile execution of an innocent man is the catalyst we need to change hearts and minds. I'm not optimistic. But conservatives have shown a remarkable callous indifference to a "culture of life" when it doesn't involve the unborn or Terri Schiavo that I think most Americans find troubling.
Right now Perry's primary challenger, Kay Bailey Hutchinson, is working overtime trying to make this a political issue in Texas. Liberals should work overtime to help her make it a national issue.
