Pro-Life Movement A Major Player In Key Criminal Justice Issue
In many politically conservative states, a subtle yet significant shift in the pro-life movement is underway: a move toward a consistent pro-life stance against the death penalty.
This month, we’re seeing it in Indiana, where three pro-life Republican lawmakers introduced a bill to end the state’s death penalty.
“I believe only one position honors our Lord and Savior, our Creator, to protect all human life,” said lead sponsor state Rep. Bob Morris, who joined other pro-life leaders at an Indiana state capitol news conference on Monday, Feb. 3.
“If we begin deciding when life is sacred versus when it is not sacred, our culture finds only regret,” Morris said. “Committed to the truth regarding life as sacred, then we should also say that every human life exists by the holy will of God Almighty, and that sacredness extends from the moment of conception until the final natural breath.”
Head east across the state line into Ohio, and you will find a similar story with a cadre of GOP state lawmakers sponsoring bills to end capital punishment.
“My strong faith and personal experience have brought me to this crossroads in criminal justice,” Republican Sen. Michele Reynolds wrote in The Columbus Dispatch. “I believe in the sanctity of human life. I believe that life starts in the mother’s womb and should continue through our natural course of being, blessed to live on God’s earth.”
In Montana, lawmakers recently debated a bill that would have “fixed” their death penalty law, making it more likely for executions to resume there after more than 18 years. “As a supporter of pro-life – in all pro-life issues – I cannot accept this particular bill,” said Republican Rep. Zack Wirth during the debate. “A person in my position, we’re all pro-life, from the womb to the tomb.”
Last year, I participated in a press conference with lawmakers in Missouri who introduced another bill to end the death penalty. “If we are truly at a 100% pro-life state, and being 100% pro-life,” said Republican Rep. Jim Murphy, “I believe that the death penalty is something that we really need to examine and put an end to because there’s just too many errors to be made and it’s just too big an error to make.”
These lawmakers are building on the legacy of GOP state lawmakers who played a role in all of the most recent states to repeal capital punishment – Virginia, Colorado, and New Hampshire – recognizing that a truly pro-life approach necessitates advocating for policies that prioritize the sanctity of all human life, even those who have committed serious crimes.
What these conservative Christian leaders understand is that at the core of being holistically pro-life is the conviction that every human being, regardless of their actions, possesses inherent dignity and a right to life. This includes those convicted of heinous crimes.
Being pro-life is about the totality of life and the sanctity of all lives – the belief that all human life is sacred and deserves protection. We don’t get to just throw away lives that don’t look like ours.
The death penalty prioritizes retribution over rehabilitation and vengeance over redemption. A truly consistent pro-life perspective should emphasize the potential for redemption and the possibility of rehabilitation, even for people who commit the most serious offenses.
One leader in the pro-life movement who is helping to fully connect these values is Abby Johnson, a well-known Texas pro-life activist who once worked as a Planned Parenthood director.
“My own story is one of redemption,” Johnson says. “I vehemently oppose the death penalty because it perpetuates the illusion that certain individuals are beyond redemption. Regardless of someone’s past actions, their life always has value. For all who are pro-life, we are called to oppose all threats to life from conception to natural death – including the death penalty.”
Compassion and forgiveness are a central tenet of many pro-life philosophies, and a growing number of people believe these values should extend to all individuals, regardless of their past actions.
How can anyone claim to be pro-life and yet be comfortable with the fact that many lives have been maligned and victimized by a criminal justice system that has failed to represent them?
Since capital punishment was reinstated in 1976, more than 200 people have been freed from death row across the country due to wrongful convictions. Take a moment to let that set in; hundreds of innocent lives have been put at risk, so far, through the death penalty. The system gets it wrong because people are not perfect, and errors happen.
Pro-life lawmakers believe grave injustices have taken place.
Indiana’s Rep. Morris believes we need “to protect all Hoosiers from the consequences of error, from the consequences of continuing what was begun by others without thought, and from the irreparable moral damage resulting from imprudence and haste.”
Elected pro-life leaders are seeing the failures of the system and coming to one conclusion – when we get the death penalty wrong even once, it is one time too many. As conservative Republicans, they do not put much faith in the ability of the government to do things right, but they believe with all their hearts in the value of human life.
There’s no two ways about it. The death penalty fundamentally contradicts the core principles of the pro-life movement, and increasingly, pro-life people in conservative states are awakening to this reality.