A few days ago, the Dallas Morning News asked a number of priminent religious leaders from Texas to assess the morality of the death penalty. Public discussion of criminal justice issues is rarely inspired by academic studies or cold statistics; discussion is prompted by specific stories. In the last few weeks, especially in Texas, the newspapers have been filled with Cameron Todd Willingham stories crammed with quotations from both sides of the debate. It’s a messy process, but we work things through in America one story at a time.
Since the religious leaders selected for the DMN story were mostly selected from moderate-to-liberal “Mainline” denominations it comes as no surprise that most of them thought the death penalty was immoral. But my eye was drawn to the only letter that eschewed complex theological arguments in favor of storytelling. Cynthia Rigby (no relation to Eleanor), Professor of Theology at Austin Presbyterian Theological Seminary, began her resp0nse with a story about her preacher daddy who escorted condemned prisoners (some of whom he believed to be innocent) to their rendezvous with the Oklahoma hangman.
Her second story hearkened back to strange story of Karla Faye Tucker, the drug-addled murderer whose broken life was redeemed by the grace of God. Televangelist Pat Robertson thought Karla Faye’s contrition ought to buy her a pass from death row, but then-governor George W. Bush made cruel jokes about Karla Faye before giving the nod to the executioner. Dr. Rigby’s story unfolds against that backdrop.
My second “scene” is from 11 years ago, shortly before the execution of Karla Faye Tucker. You might remember that the late ’90s was the time when the “WWJD?” (“What Would Jesus Do?”) movement was in full swing. In a class I was teaching, I asked my mainly-mainliner seminary students if they saw any value to “WWJD?,” and if they thought we should do what Jesus would do, if we were pretty clear on exactly what that was. Every student in the class (20+, as I recall) answered, emphatically, “yes!!”
Since the biggest issue in the news that week was that Tucker was asking for a stay of execution, I spontaneously asked: “Would JESUS execute Karla Faye Tucker?” “No!” all the students answered. Feeling like I was on a roll, I then asked, “Well, then: should WE execute Karla Faye Tucker?”
Silence in response to a question that I thought was a no-brainer, in light of the conversation. Suddenly, the mood of the class shifted. My students acted indignant; as though they had been betrayed. A senior student shot his hand in the air, declaring that he thought it would be “presumptuous for us to assume we could do what Jesus should do.” “We need a new question,” he said: “WWJWUTD?” “What would Jesus want us to do?” he asked, looking around at his classmates. And then he answered: “Jesus would want us to leave forgiveness to him, and to EXECUTE Karla Faye Tucker.”
We took another vote, and all but 2 of my students agreed with him.
Kinda makes your blood run cold, don’t it.
Friends of Justice 
No, it does not.
If you know the Tucker case, she, quite specifically, laid the outcome on God’s doorstep, saying that the final outcome of her case would be God’s decision, God’s will.
Well, in my bookKarla Faye was mistaken. I seriously doubt that God wanted her killed. The ultimate outcome, or at least the penultimate outcome, was in the hands of George W. Bush.
I was just stating Tucker’s beliefs.
You beliefs are in error. The most Bush could do is grant a one time 30 day stay. There was no reason to do so.
I think you are mistaken. I think the governor has power to pardon or commute.
You are mistaken.
A Texas Governor can pardon or commute only if a majority of the parole board makes such a recommendation.
They did not.
Okay.
I Googled this and found that Dudley Sharp is correct. But the governor can request a full clemency hearing by the Board of Pardons and Paroles. Governor Bush could not have granted clemency to Karla Faye w/o consent of the Board. But he did consent to her death, thus closing any chance of clemency.
Dudley is technically correct, but in reality the Board of Pardons and Parole is a VERY political body that would no doubt support commutation of a sentence if the Governor supported it. When Rick Perry has supported commutation publicly, e.g., they’ve ALWAYS supported his position. When he doesn’t, no matter how egregious the circumstance they’ve never acted against his express wishes, particularly in capital cases. That would also have been the case if GWB had asked them to commute Karla Faye’s sentence.
Thanks, everyone, for your comments. I didn’t want to rehash the Karla Faye Tucker issue and am certainly not well informed on the subject. But I think Scott’s point about the political relationship between Governor’s and the Board of Pardons and Paroles is precisely on point. In the normal flow of business, the board often doesn’t meet and members communicate via fax or email. When a particular case makes the headlines it receives much more careful attention and everything will be worked out at the political level before the matter is ever discussed by the Board. In Texas, it is assumed that the answer is always ‘no’ unless extraordinary conditions exist. The Board and the Governor are independent only in theory.
But Perry overruled the parole board’s 5-2 drecommendation to commute Robert Lee Thomson’s death sentence to life in prison. Thomson was executed yesterday. he was an accomplice, not the shooter, in a 1996 murder. The shooter, Sammy Butler, received a life sentence. I guess different juries look at things differently. Duh!