The Toxic Vengeance of Capital Punishment

This was the idea that inspired Jefferson, as he set about reforming Virginia’s penal code, confining capital punishment to murder and treason, and drastically reducing the number of physical punishments on the books. “Let mercy be the character of the law-giver,” he wrote. But let the law be as certain as gravity. Jefferson denied that in disputing “the sanguinary hue of our penal laws” he was being soft on crime or naïvely optimistic about human nature. For laws to be effective, they had to be reasonable, proportionate, and mild. One of his models was William Penn, who showed that the “principles of peace, of reason and right” can hold their own in the realm of government. Although it’s unfortunate that he did not practice what he preached, Jefferson’s remarks on the corrosive effects of slavery reflected his notion that violence is a contagion and the law must limit its spread. “[F]or man is an imitative animal,” he wrote, and imitation is the seed of all education. When the child sees the parent lashing out, he “catches the lineaments of wrath.” Thus “nursed” and trained in tyranny, a tyrant is what he becomes.