Robert Badinter, Former French Justice Minister, and Death Penalty Abolitionist, Dies at 95

Robert Badinter, a fierce defend­er of human rights, defense lawyer, and for­mer French jus­tice min­is­ter who led the effort to abol­ish the death penal­ty in his coun­try, died on February 9, 2024. Mr. Badinter influ­enced many legal changes, includ­ing laws that decrim­i­nal­ized homo­sex­u­al­i­ty, improved prison con­di­tions, and advo­cat­ed for his own par­tic­u­lar con­cept of jus­tice. As a defense lawyer, Mr. Badinter wit­nessed the exe­cu­tion of one of his clients, and vivid­ly recalled the hor­rors involved with the use of the guil­lo­tine. In 1981, one of his first offi­cial actions as Justice Minister was to seek the abo­li­tion of the death penal­ty in France. ​“A coun­try pas­sion­ate about free­dom can­not retain the death penal­ty as part of its laws,” he said. Following the enac­tion of the law abol­ish­ing cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment, Mr. Badinter told his col­leagues that ​“tomor­row, thanks to you, France’s jus­tice will no longer be a jus­tice that kills.” 

Mr. Badinter served as France’s Minister of Justice from 1981 to 1986, where he over­came pub­lic sup­port for the death penal­ty and gained par­lia­men­tary sup­port for abo­li­tion. For near­ly the next decade Mr. Badinter worked as the pres­i­dent of France’s Constitutional Council, which reviews French law to ensure it aligns with the con­sti­tu­tion. Following his role as pres­i­dent, Mr. Badinter served in the French Senate as a rep­re­sen­ta­tive of the Socialist par­ty from 1995 to 2011, where ​“he pro­gres­sive­ly came to resem­ble the con­science of the repub­lic, a fer­vent defend­er of the rule of law.”

Born in Paris to Jewish immi­grants from Bessarabia in March 1928, Mr. Badinter ​“was raised to respect the lib­er­al val­ues and tol­er­ance of the French repub­lic.” In 1943, dur­ing the height of World War II, Mr. Badinter’s father was deport­ed from France and sent to a Nazi death camp, from which he never returned. 

After the announce­ment of his death, French President Emmanuel Macron told reporters that Mr. Badinter ​“is a touch­stone for many gen­er­a­tions” and that he is a ​“fig­ure of the cen­tu­ry” who ​“nev­er ceased to advo­cate for the ideas of the Enlightenment.” France’s cur­rent Minister of Justice and for­mer defense lawyer Éric Dupond-Moretti said on social media that as some­one who was ​“deeply com­mit­ted to jus­tice, an advo­cate of abo­li­tion, a man of law and pas­sion, [Mr. Badinter] leaves a void that match­es his lega­cy: immeasurable.”