Execution

Execution in America has been a controversial subject of debate in recent decades. However, execution and torture itself goes back thousands of years and was turned into what those at the time considered an art form, in the middle ages. It is important for me to illustrate some of the methods of torture and execution throughout history for one to have a grasp of the current debate as to whether or not execution is an ethical practice in today’s society. This writing does not intend to prove pro or con as a just finality since such a proclamation would be futile. Instead, I will bring to light the stark realities of what human beings are capable of and what can possibly be considered social norms or deviancy based on chronological, sociological, ethical and moral situations.

I will go into detail of only a few of the methods of torture used throughout certain periods of history for the sake of the length constraints of this paper, though such illustrations will be more than adequate in leading up to the current ethical considerations on the subject of execution and torture.

The practice of torture and execution goes back to ancient times, though the documented specifics of such events date back to the middle ages, and the frequency and prevalence of these occurrences were also at their peak during this time.

In addition, these tortures and subsequent executions were often witnessed by a great deal of spectators as a form of entertainment; refreshments would be served and parties held in the protagonists honor.

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Two specific cases are as follows: Widely applied in the armed forces, and initiated by the Spanish and utilized up to and including the last century, The Spanish Donkey was the means by which traitors, deserters and insubordinates were dealt with. The torture consisted of seating the victim, hands tied behind the back, astride a wall, the top of which resembled an inverted ‘V’. Weights were then attached to the ankles, these being slowly increased until the victim’s body split in two. This type of device also existed in the British army, though , instead of a cumbersome wall, the appliance was made by nailing suitably shaped wooden planks together in the shape of a horse, its backbone forming a sharp ridge about eight or nine feet long, thereby allowing more than one victim to be punished at a time.

Due to the risk of death, even when prescribed only as a minor punishment, It was realized that, unlike floggings and similar corrective measures, which healed fairly rapidly, the donkey could incapacitate a soldier and make him permanently unfit for army duties, and so the practice was eventually discontinued.

Naval captains of most nations, even as recently as the nineteenth century, had absolute authority over their crews and took whatever measures they saw fit in order to maintain discipline. Serious crimes such as incitement of mutiny, striking an officer and the like, warranted the death sentence. One method of administering this verdict was something called keel-hauling. In 1710 an English Sailor, guilty of blasphemy was stripped of all his clothes except for a strip of cloth around his loins. He was suspended by blocks and pulleys, and these were fastened to the opposite extremities of the yard-arm and a weight

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was hung upon his legs to sink him to a competent depth.

By this apparatus he was drawn up close to the yard-arm, then let fall into the sea where, by hauling on the pulleys of the other end of the yard, he was passed under the ship’s bottom and after some little time, was hoisted up on the other side of the ship; this after sufficient intervals of breathing, was repeated two or three times.

It should be remembered that the height of the old sailing ships was considerable, the fall in itself resulting in possible injury being sustained on hitting the surface of the sea; then to be half drowned, dragged across the hull, which was invariably encrusted with barnacles, limpets, mollusks and other marine creatures, their shells rasping flesh and muscle off ones bones, must have been an ordeal indeed.

Two other methods of torture and execution that are certainly more recent are The Electric Chair and Lethal Injection. The chair was first used on William Kemmler in 1890 in Auburn, New York and injection introduced in the 1970’s. The latter many consider to be the most humane way of putting someone to death in history. However, this may not be true in all cases, especially if the chemical mixture is not perfect, which can result in a very agonizing end.

Lethal injection will be discussed in concentration here since this is the most controversial, recent and common method of execution in the United States in this day and age.

Jonathan Groner, an Ohio doctor of pediatric surgery in Columbus’ Children’s Hospital and associate professor at Ohio State University College of Medicine and Public Health states “ A humane execution in the ultimate paradox.” The reason for this paradox is that

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in order to execute people without “inflicting torture” states would have to employ licensed doctors to administer the chemical cocktail, but medical professionals are bound to an oath and ethics to do no harm, and are ethically unable to participate in executions. Groner more specifically calls this cycle the “executioner’s paradox.” Using Ohio State as a template, this writer can illustrate as done earlier , the specifics of the lethal injection procedure and protocol; it is as follows:

The prisoner is strapped to a stretcher and injected with anesthetic sodium pentothal. Without anesthesia the inmate would experience asphyxiation, a severe burning sensation, and cardiac arrest. Now unconscious, the prisoner is injected with pancuronium bromide, which paralyses muscles including the lungs and diaphragm. Pavulon is often used in immobilizing patients during surgical procedures.

The two drugs are followed by an injection of potassium chloride, which causes cardiac arrest; this would also produce tremendous pain to a conscious inmate.

A study published in 2005 by the English medical journal Lancet, authors found that on the basis of toxicology reports from six U.S. states 43% of prisoners had remained conscious after the dose of sedatives was administered. The Lancet concluded that “It would be a cruel way to die: awake, paralyzed, unable to move, to breath, while potassium burned through your veins.”

The question still looms however, with the eye for an eye society; and it is a very valid question. How would you feel if the same inmate receiving death by injection had murdered your wife, daughter ect. I suppose very good questions like this cannot be answered unless it has actually occurred to an individual. Is a life sentence in prison more

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of a punishment than death? Those on death row sometimes remain there for years before they walk through the valley of the shadow of death. Groner states that in regards to this current question, “All of Europe does not execute people. Our founding fathers conscious decision was that we wouldn’t be an eye for an eye society. I would also say that you can judge a society by is prisons. How we take care of society’s ill off reflects on a society at large; and there is nobody worse off than a death row inmate.”

This is a bit off point for our purposes here however. The true issue here lies with “the executioners”, who are essentially the licensed doctors who are actually giving the final death blow. Is it unethical for doctors to aid in the administration and execution of individuals? In my honest opinion, yes. Do I think that other methods of execution would not put doctors in the position as executioner? Yes. Do I think that lethal injection should be discarded in favor of other methods of execution that do not place doctors in the questionable ehical practice of execution? Yes. This intellectual venture was not about abolishing or not abolishing the death penalty, it was a matter of the ethics involved for the doctors who must take part in such events. I do not think that they should be involved in the process.

References

Sturm, D. (2006, October 12). Is lethal injection barbaric? Ohio revisits the ethics of execution. The Free Press. Retrieved April 12, 2007, from

http://www.freepress.org/departments/display/2/2006/2178

Abbot, G. (2005) Execution: The Guillotine, the Pendulum, the Thousand Cuts, the Spanish Donkey, and 66 Other Ways of Putting Someone to Death. New York New York: St. Martin’s Press.