Rise above barbarism of capital punishment

Government shouldn't stoop to killing.

Beheading a convicted murderer is bloody business. So is placing someone before a firing squad. Equally gruesome is shaving someone's head, strapping him to a chair and jolting him with electricity until he dies or placing him in a chamber to be filled with cyanide gas.

So in a quest to find "humane" ways to execute criminals, most states now use lethal injections.

But the recent execution by lethal injection of a convicted Florida murderer was hardly humane.

Angel Nieves Diaz took more than half an hour to die - a process that usually takes about 15 minutes. He needed a second dose of lethal chemicals, meaning the state essentially executed him twice. Instead of injecting the drugs into his veins, the needles were pushed into surrounding soft tissue. It was reported Diaz had chemical burns on both arms.

The botched procedure led Gov. Jeb Bush to declare a moratorium on Florida executions. Separately, a federal judge in California ruled that lethal injections violate the constitutional ban on cruel and unusual punishment. Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger has ordered his staff to revise the method's procedure. In addition, the Maryland Court of Appeals recently ruled that procedures for lethal injection were adopted without appropriate oversight.

Iowa law forbids capital punishment, but 38 states and the federal government allow it.

One horrifying case at a time, though, the country might be figuring out there is no such thing as a humane execution.

We recognize many Americans won't care whether Diaz died a painful death. After all, he was a killer. What he did was unthinkable.

But even more unthinkable is our government killing its own people. The practice has little or no value as a deterrent. Locking up murderers for life will protect society by preventing them from killing again.

"Eye for an eye" punishments are barbaric and unacceptable in contemporary society. Juries do not order rapists to be raped. Judges don't steal from thieves or order those guilty of assault to be beaten. Civilized societies don't mete out equal retaliation because they realize they're supposed to rise above the level of criminals.

Perhaps this country is experiencing such an ascension, albeit slowly.

Last year, the Supreme Court outlawed the death penalty for those who were 16 or 17 when they committed the crimes. Before that, the court ruled that executing mentally retarded criminals violated the Constitution.

Courts define "cruel and unusual" by using "evolving standards of decency."

One hopes this country has evolved to the point of understanding that it is impossible for a civilized government to humanely kill a killer.