NEW VOICES: Former Ambassador to France Addresses Impact of Death Penalty on Foreign Relations

In a recent op-ed in The New York Times, Felix G. Rohatyn (pic­tured), the U.S. Ambassador to France from 1997 to 2001, not­ed that dur­ing his tenure ​“no sin­gle issue was viewed with as much hos­til­i­ty as our sup­port for the death penal­ty.” Rohatyn urged the U.S. to con­sid­er the impact of main­tain­ing cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment on our rela­tions with our allies, and he stat­ed that con­sid­er­a­tion of inter­na­tion­al trends is appro­pri­ate when cas­es are reviewed by the Supreme Court. Rohatyn wrote:

During my four years as the American ambas­sador to France, I dis­cov­ered that no sin­gle issue was viewed with as much hos­til­i­ty as our sup­port for the death penal­ty. Outlawed by every mem­ber of the European Union, the death penal­ty was, and is, viewed in Europe as a throw­back to the Middle Ages. When we require European sup­port on secu­ri­ty issues — Iran’s nuclear pro­gram; the war in Iraq; North Korea’s bomb; rela­tions with China and Russia; the Middle East peace process — our job is made more dif­fi­cult by the inten­si­ty of pop­u­lar oppo­si­tion in Europe to our policy.

Several years ago, Justice Anthony Kennedy spoke to the senior staff of our embassy in Paris on this issue to help them explain our posi­tion to a very hos­tile French audi­ence. I was agree­ably sur­prised when he indi­cat­ed his belief that soon­er or lat­er, we would have to take into account the views of Europeans in deter­min­ing what con­sti­tutes ​“cru­el and unusual punishment.”

Last March, the Supreme Court, in a 5 to 4 deci­sion, abol­ished cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment for juve­nile offend­ers, con­clud­ing that the death penal­ty for minors is indeed cru­el and unusu­al pun­ish­ment. ​“Our deter­mi­na­tion,” Justice Kennedy wrote in the major­i­ty deci­sion, ​“finds con­fir­ma­tion in the stark real­i­ty that the United States is the only coun­try in the world that con­tin­ues to give offi­cial sanc­tion to the juve­nile death penal­ty.”
…

[G]lobalization has made it not only ​“appro­pri­ate or use­ful” but vital to look at for­eign laws. It is in our inter­est to be aware of their impact whether they con­cern antitrust, food safe­ty or the death penal­ty. Contempt for the laws of our allies is a major fac­tor in our increas­ing iso­la­tion in the world .…

(New York Times, January 26, 2006). See New Voices and International.