As the second-ever nitrogen gas execution took place in Alabama last week, the debate over the morality of the death penalty has once again resurfaced. The casualty of the execution, Alan Eugene Miller, was sentenced to death in 1999 after committing three murders. According to witnesses of the execution, Miller endured seizure-like spasms and produced “periodic gulping breaths” for several minutes before finally turning still. Execution by nitrogen gas involves replacing breathable air with nitrogen gas, causing death by asphyxia, a process deemed “painless” and “humane” by state officials. UN experts however have unequivocally condemned the execution method as nothing short of “state-sanctioned torture.” Before considering the amount of pain any type of execution causes however, one must first question the moral justification for the death penalty in the first place. Central to the debate is the idea of “retribution,” where a criminal offender receives punishment of similar degree to their crime. It is this concept that morally justifies capital punishment, even if its implementation can be improved.
The concept of “an eye for an eye” or lex talionis has existed throughout history, from the Law of Moses to the Code of Hammurabi. Real justice demands people to suffer for a crime in a way that is proportional to its severity, through which they pay their “debts to society.” Some critics argue that the suffering caused by the death penalty is not actually reflective of the crime, with anticipatory suffering of the criminal making the death penalty a “double punishment,” involving both the execution and the preceding wait. In the U.S. for example, the average wait time for execution is over 19 years. This argument falls apart when one considers that there are no alternative punishments proportional to the severity of murder. A life sentence is not enough — the criminal still retains what they have taken away from another human being, the right to live, perhaps a person’s most important and inalienable right. By committing murder, a criminal has forfeited their right to live, and only by ending their own life can they re-establish a moral balance. The death penalty is unique as a retributive punishment since offenders of other crimes do not receive a punishment that replicates their offense — rapists for example aren’t sexually assaulted and pickpockets aren’t pickpocketed. They are however penalized on a proportional scale. Rapists receive much longer sentences than pickpockets for example. With murderers, however, this simply isn’t possible. Only death is proportional to the crime of taking another’s life.
Some critics argue that retribution is simply a “sanitized form of revenge,” referencing the “howling mobs” attacking prison vans carrying death row inmates or the public lynchings of alleged criminals. Such actions suggest that vengeance, a more morally dubious concept, remains a major factor in the public popularity of capital punishment. Retribution, however, designed to re-establish justice, can easily be distinguished from vengeance and vindictiveness through several key differences. The execution of retributive justice is not personal, with its implementation deriving from the individual’s actions, directed only at wrongdoing. Neither does it involve the pleasure of the enforcer, a common characteristic of vengeance, with law enforcement employees rather than families of victims carrying out the execution. The existence of inherent limits and established standards further distinguish it from revenge. The reaction or opinions of the public have no consequence upon the justification of the punishment itself and therefore should be considered a separate matter.
Official retribution such as capital punishment also helps channel retributive public sentiment into more rule-based official political and legal systems. This helps deter people from resorting to lynchings and other forms of vigilante self-help, the very forms of vengeance critics of capital punishment are so intent on preventing. This brings us to consider the other stakeholder in any murder scenario – the victim. In addition to punishing the offender, retributive justice such as the death penalty provides well-deserved closure for families and victims. Many relatives of victims believe that the death penalty is “the only way for their lives to move forward.” As Phyllis Loya, mother of a murdered police officer, said, “I will live to see the execution of my son’s murderer. People need closure.”
However, although retribution lends moral justification to capital punishment, there are concerns regarding its implementation. In the specific context of the United States, the death penalty is not used consistently as a retributive measure. Only a small minority of murderers are executed, with critics arguing that such selection does not amount to a consistent program of retribution, thus undermining the retributive argument. Moreover, the imposition of the death penalty is steeped in poor legal assistance and racial bias. According to the Equal Justice Initiative, “the death penalty is mostly imposed on poor people who cannot afford to hire an effective lawyer.” Three-quarters of those who are assigned a legal aid lawyer are sentenced to death, a figure that drops to a quarter if the defendant can afford private counsel. People of color are also more likely to be sentenced, with African Americans making up 41 percent of inmates on death row, despite only accounting for 13 percent of the U.S. population. Such biases present major hurdles to the true implementation of retributive justice and must be scrutinized more deeply.
From a moral standpoint, capital punishment as a method of retribution remains wholly justified, and with improved procedures, has the potential to become a potent tool of legal justice. Though this topic may seem distant from high schoolers, it is important to discuss such issues as members of society. We may even apply and utilize some elements of this discussion to our own lives, such as the key differences between revenge and retribution, or that moral justification does not guarantee righteous implementation. Capital punishment is by no means perfect — it cannot bring back Lee Holdbrooks, Terry Jarvis, or Christopher Yancy, the victims of Miller, nor can it adequately compensate their families — but it is the best we can do to establish moral balance. 
