Reverberations from Birmingham News rejecting the death penalty

I suggested in this post that the recent editorial series from the Birmingham News, entitled “Choosing Life in a Death Penalty State,” might mark a turning point in the modern cultural story of capital punishment.  Interestingly, this AP story provides a detailed account of the series and the reaction it has generated.  Of particular interest is this report:

[T]he newspaper hasn’t received much negative response to its change of heart, according to editorial page editor Bob Blalock. “So far the reaction has been overwhelmingly positive,” he said.

Meanwhile, in cannot be a matter of coincidence that today the Mobile Register runs this extended commentary which argues forcefully that “the Legislature should place a moratorium on executions in Alabama.”  Notably, this commentary focuses on the new ACLU report entitled “Broken Justice: The Death Penalty in Alabama” (noted before here), but it echoes many of the themes in the  Birmingham News editorial series.

Back at the Birmingham News, today the paper has this heart-felt commentary from Alabama law professor Susan Pace Hamill, which emphasizes the links between religion and the death penalty.  Here are some choice quotes from a piece entitled “A Spiritual Issue”:

I strongly believe as a state where most of us claim to be Christian believers, we must spiritually confront the injustice within Alabama’s death penalty system as resulting primarily from the sins of greed, indifference and vengeance….

Our state will not be able to provide justice for both victims of capital crimes and defendants accused of them unless our religious leaders courageously challenge all of us to confront the death penalty as a major spiritual issue that must find balance between … conflicting ways of perceiving this raw and ugly world.