February 14, 2007
Colorado
Archbishop cites reasons to oppose the death penalty
By The Denver Post
Colorado should eliminate the death penalty immediately, but cost savings
shouldn't be the rationale, Denver Roman Catholic Archbishop Charles Chaput
argues this week in his Denver Catholic Register column.
Chaput credits Rep. Paul Weissmann, a Louisville Democrat, for opening a
"very valuable debate" with a bill that would abolish the state's death
penalty and use the savings to investigate unsolved murders.
The legislation passed a House committee last week.
Chaput doesn't take a position on the bill.
He called Weissmann's argument "ingenious" but cited other reasons to oppose
capital punishment, which Catholic tradition allows only in extraordinary
circumstances.
"The death penalty is a bad idea because it diminishes the society that
employs it," Chaput wrote. "It doesn't deter capital crime. It doesn't bring
back the dead. It doesn't give anyone 'peace.' It sometimes kills the
innocent. It coarsens our own humanity and sense of justice."
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Source : Denver Post
http://www.denverpo
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