Alabama Governor Kay Ivey has drawn criticism for denying clemency and presiding over the execution of Michael Samra (pictured) on May 16, 2019, one day after issuing a statement calling Alabama a pro-life state and declaring life “precious” and “sacred.” On May 15, Ivey signed into law a bill that criminalizes abortion, saying that the new law “stands as a powerful testament to Alabamians’ deeply held belief that every life is precious and that every life is a sacred gift from God.” After Samra’s execution the following evening, her office issued a statement that “Alabama will not stand for the loss of life in our state, and with this heinous crime, we must respond with punishment. … This evening justice has been delivered to the loved ones of these victims, and it signals that Alabama does not tolerate murderous acts of any nature.”
Ivey’s actions prompted rebukes from liberal and conservative quarters and renewed the question of whether one who supports capital punishment can be considered “pro-life.” “It’s a contradiction that I always observed,” said Hannah Cox, the national manager of Conservatives Concerned About the Death Penalty. Supporting the death penalty, Ms. Cox told The New York Times, is “a stance that cheapens the pro-life argument.” Krisanne Vaillancourt Murphy, executive director of the Catholic Mobilizing Network, an anti-death penalty advocacy group, said “[p]ro-life values are meaningless when they are inconsistent.” She said that “[t]he sanctity of human life applies to each and every person, innocent and guilty,” and that a person’s dignity “is not lost even after the commission of very serious crimes.”
Ivey’s actions also were criticized in articles in The Los Angeles Times and CNN. Los Angeles Times opinion writer Scott Martelle highlighted some of the seven executions Ivey has overseen, including Walter Moody, the oldest person executed in the U.S., and Domineque Ray, a Muslim prisoner who was denied the presence of his imam during his execution. “Apparently, Ivey’s not averse to returning some of God’s sacred gifts,” Martelle wrote. “If Ivey had the courage of her convictions, she would use her authority as governor to grant clemency to [the] 181 people facing execution in Alabama. That act would … remove the cloud of hypocrisy hovering over Montgomery.” In a CNN commentary, Jay Parisi wrote: “The anti-abortion movement raises a question about capital punishment that must be answered. If the 25 white men who voted in the Alabama senate for a near-total ban on abortion were really serious about the ‘right to life,’ would they not have simultaneously banned capital punishment? The death penalty is a clear violation of this right ….” Parisi called it “deeply ironic that the seven states that have passed tighter abortion laws are also actively open to killing live human beings by lethal injection or electrocution.”
The week before Samra’s execution, Cox authored a commentary for Newsmax in which she critiqued the “inconsistency” and “hypocrisy” of arguments by people who identify themselves as pro-life, yet support capital punishment. “[A]s a Christian,” she wrote, “I believe that all life has inherent value that cannot be won or lost by anything we do, but rather that is based on all being created in the image of God.” She addressed the oft-repeated reasoning that only innocent life deserves to be protected, explaining, “there are countless innocent people caught up in the criminal justice system, and certainly on death rows. To date, one person has been exonerated from death row for every ten executions. You cannot buttress your belief in capital punishment with the reasoning that you only think innocent life should be protected.” Cox said, “The vast majority of people who commit harm were first victimized numerous times — often as children — before they became violent. … You cannot say you care about the lives of young children and want to protect them from harm, and then believe they should be executed when they are harmed and end up perpetuating the cycle of violence.”
Cox told The New York Times that the pro-life dialogue about the death penalty continues to shift, notwithstanding the events in Alabama. Growing conservative opposition to capital punishment, she said, is evidenced by the introduction of Republican-sponsored bills to repeal the death penalty in 11 state legislatures in 2019.
(Hannah Cox, Pro-Life Views Fall Flat When They Aren’t Consistent, Newsmax, May 10, 2019; Adeel Hassan and Alan Blinder, Alabama Executes a Murderer a Day After Banning Abortions, The New York Times, May 16, 2019; Scott Martelle, Alabama’s antiabortion governor urges respect for life, will oversee a 7th execution, The Los Angeles Times, May 16, 2019; Jay Parini, Alabama’s ‘pro-life’ governor is a hypocrite, CNN, May 17, 2019.) See Executions and New Voices.
