Not that long ago, the US Supreme Court voted that it is “cruel and unusual” punishment to sentence a juvenile to death. I posted a link to a news story about this earlier/a, but didn’t think much more about it at the time. But I should have. While I personally do not think the death penalty is justifiable in this country anywhere near the frequency with which people are sentenced to die, it is important to remember that, used appropriately, where no other method will realistically protect the populace from the criminal, it is a legitimate exercise of power by the State. Seen in this light, the flawed reasoning that went into this decision becomes more comment-worthy. Given that I think we can/em protect society short of execution, we should not be sentencing people to death; to that extent I am happy to see this decision. I would, however, have wished it to be on more morally acceptable grounds. The ends do not justify the means, and the reasoning used to come to this decision is, I think, potentially disastrous.

Tony Blankley’s article, “Black robes and betrayal/a,” is responsible for my realization on this issue. I remember seeing something about this earlier, agreeing that it is not a good development, but it did not strike me enough to cause comment. This time it did. Several things are going on here. First of all, we are defining adults arbitrarily at 18. This is flawed, the defining characteristic of an adult is not only physical maturity, which hits some more rapid developers before 18, and which some research suggests does not reach others until well after 18, maybe as late as 25, but an acceptance of responsibility. It is an acceptance that some people never/em make, choosing to blame others, society, those of a different race, those with more wealth, others, rather than accepting that they alone determine what they do and do not do. These people never really grow up, at 40, they are as much children as they were at 10, and can be trusted no more than the 10 year old can. Attempting to trust them brings divorce, neglect, failed marriages, poorly raised children. Alternately, you hear of the child who missed out on childhood, the one who grew up too fast, too soon. The difference? This child accepted responsibility before we, as a society, as individuals, expect it, accepted a level of responsibility unusual in one of those years.

Still, there is some merit to the age distinction. As you leave high school, the extended adolescence of college not withstanding, your character is mostly/em formed. For good or for ill, the impetus for reform will now come from within, though example can of course still help. As you grow younger, you are still learning, growing. The positive role model, structure, discipline,can still shape the person you become, reform can be encouraged more strongly, more hopefully. And so we are right to attempt to reform the youngster, while acting more punitively against the adult, even if the adult is child-like from unwillingness to, in that wonderful expression, “act his age.”

With this extended preface, I come to the recent decision, which relied on none of these ideas. Nor did it rely on some reading of our constitution, our history and precedent, or some body of fact. Rather it relied on the impression of some justices that there are “evolving standards of decency.” Perhaps someday our “standards of decency” will have “evolved” to the point that we allow rapists and murders go free without jail time. Perhaps we will “evolve” to the point where only the “indecent” practice their faith in public. Perhaps on the other hand we will “evolve” into a society that thinks torture or brainwashing is an acceptable way to handle criminals. All of these rather far fetched results are the logical conclusions of such a decision. Instead of basing their decision on reason, on fact, on permanent principles and truth, they choose to rely on fallible human conscience and fallible societal mores. Heaven help us as we descend further into the abyss of moral relativity.