# Bush pardon saves two lives. **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [November 23, 2006, 3:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-pardon-saves-two-lives/381551 "2006-11-23T15:14:44Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 15\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![Blaster\_Master](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/cab0a1/32.png) [@Blaster\_Master](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blaster_Master)\ **Post date:** [November 24, 2006, 10:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-pardon-saves-two-lives/381551/61 "2006-11-24T22:58:51Z")
[QUOTE=Bricker] Not sure I agree. Activist judges do, as you correctly point out, usurp their roles as interpreters of the law when they inject their own desires for a particular result into the process and skew their decisions to support that end goal. But a governor is different. The law clearly states that he has the power to pardon or commute under certain circumstances – in Texas, of course, that power is not unilateral; in other states, it is. Just as the legislators are correctly excercising their roles if they pass laws outlawing the deat penalty, the governor is correctly exercising his role if he pardons or commutes sentences in accord with his own discretion. It’s true that by doing this, he may thwart the will of the populace – but the populace has a remedy: they may remove him from office. Ask Gray Davis how effective that remedy can be. A governor is also corrrectly executing his role if he chooses never to pardon anyone, confident that the death penalty is legally and morally being applied correctly. That’s the perk of being elected as the chief executive – you get to wield that authority. [/QUOTE] I agree that a governor in most states is generally unilaterally permitted that power (admittedly, a failure in my analogy), it was not the point I was attempting to make that it is not within is power; my point was that possessing that power is not an excuse in and of itself to use it. While to my knowledge there are generally no provisions for what reasons a governor may pardon a convicted felon, there is generally an element of custom and, shall I say, “good taste”. That is, to my knowledge, there is generally an establish precedence for when a governor should and should not exercise that power. It is my opinion that, especially in a state as strongly pro-death penalty as Virginia or Texas, if a governor overturned most or all death sentences, not on the merit of evidence or law, but on a purely moral or religious ground, the populace may become jaded with the judicial process. That is, why bother having a death penalty for the most serious of crimes if it is not able to be used when it is legally called for? To me, a governor with such behavior would essentially be circumventing the law; he’d effectively be removing the death penalty from the books during is term without the voice of the people or the legislative branch. Now, if he wants to use it here and there for various reasons, that’s a different story all together, but if he attempts to patently refuse to execute all or even most of the inmates on death row on moral or religious grounds, while he may have the power, I would tend to view it as an abuse. ---
**Author:** ![Boyo\_Jim](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/87869e/32.png) [@Boyo\_Jim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Boyo_Jim)\ **Post date:** [November 24, 2006, 11:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-pardon-saves-two-lives/381551/62 "2006-11-24T23:01:51Z")
[QUOTE=Walloon] [Executive Clemency in Texas](http://www.tdcj.state.tx.us/bpp/exec_clem/exec_clem.html):On February 2, 1998 (the eve of Karla Faye Tucker’s scheduled execution), the Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles, which could have recommend a pardon for Tucker to Gov. George Bush, rejected her request to have her death sentence changed to life in prison. Therefore, Governor Bush had no consitutional power to pardon her or to commute her sentence. [/QUOTE] I believe you are mis-reading this clause, and that it does grant the governor the power to grant a pardon whether or not a parole board okays it. You are attaching a sentence clause to the wrong subject… > [@](#): > > the Governor shall have power, after conviction, on the written signed recommendation and advice of the Board of Pardons and Paroles, or a majority thereof, to grant reprieves and commutations of punishment and pardons; You interpret it as: the governor has the power to grant pardons and reprieves if a majority of the parole board reccommends it. I interpret it as: the governor has the power to grant pardons and reprieves, only after reviewing a written recommendation from the parole board. I believe the constitution requires the governor to consider input from the board, not that he take it. The “grant repreives and commutations” clause belongs with “the governor has the power to”. It should not attach to. “the recommendation of the board”. ---
**Author:** ![wring](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/838e76/32.png) [@wring](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wring)\ **Post date:** [November 24, 2006, 11:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-pardon-saves-two-lives/381551/63 "2006-11-24T23:02:13Z")
It’s not the difference in our beliefs - the **law** is that not every crime is subject to the death penalty, not even all deaths. and once the conviction and sentence has been issued, the \*\* law\*\* allows for other actions - appeals of sentence and sentencing through the judicial circuit, as well as the possability of pardon or commutation of sentence from the executive branchs (typeically the governor). the point I was making was that generally speaking actual innocence should result in the person being released from incarceration (unless, of course there were other concurrent sentences), whereas in most cases, commutation of death penalty is **not** the preferred redress for actual innocence, but held out as a possability for various other reasons. These could be for sentencing errors but usually that sort of thing would be actionable through the court system. So, for argument’s sake wrt Bush and his DP record in TX, the cases submitted for shouldn’t include those cases where actual innocence was alledged (as I pointed out, god, we’d **hope** that those folks would have something better than LWOP), but where there is some other reason to spare the persons life. REdeamtion being one potential. you obviously disagree that redemtion should be a used to commute the DP, but it does appear to be one of the legitimate claims. ---
**Author:** ![Captain\_Carrot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f0a364/32.png) [@Captain\_Carrot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Carrot)\ **Post date:** [November 24, 2006, 11:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-pardon-saves-two-lives/381551/64 "2006-11-24T23:11:24Z")
[QUOTE=Boyo Jim] > [@](#): > > the Governor shall have power, after conviction, on the written signed recommendation and advice of the Board of Pardons and Paroles, or a majority thereof, to grant reprieves and commutations of punishment and pardons; I interpret it as: the governor has the power to grant pardons and reprieves, only after reviewing a written recommendation from the parole board. I believe the constitution requires the governor to consider input from the board, not that he take it. [/QUOTE] I think the implication is certainly that the governor is supposed to be acting on the wishes of said Board; however, I also think it is possible to disagree on the literal parsing of the text (translation: it seems plain to me that it says that clearly, but you can validly interpret it slightly differently). Saying “the Governor shall have power…on the … recommendation … of the Board… to grant reprieves” sounds to me like “If the board says to pardon the prisoner, the Governor can do it.” ---
**Author:** ![Boyo\_Jim](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/87869e/32.png) [@Boyo\_Jim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Boyo_Jim)\ **Post date:** [November 24, 2006, 11:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-pardon-saves-two-lives/381551/65 "2006-11-24T23:15:50Z")
Some more research on my part has determined that my interpretation – which I hold as logically valid, is apparently NOT the accepted interpretation of the language. I accept that the governor, inder the current understanding, has very limited power of pardon. So, apologies **Walloon**. I wonder if this particular language has ever been tested in court. Does anyone know whether some governor ever tried hard to pardon someone that the parole board didn’t want pardoned? ---
**Author:** ![Martin\_Hyde](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/47e85d/32.png) [@Martin\_Hyde](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martin_Hyde)\ **Post date:** [November 24, 2006, 11:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-pardon-saves-two-lives/381551/66 "2006-11-24T23:44:45Z")
[QUOTE=Blaster Master] Interestingly enough, there was a race here in Virginia with this very issue as one of the major points of debate; the Democratic candidate and our current governor, Tim Kaine, ended up having to defend his personal beliefs against the death penalty saying, in effect, that even though he is against the death penalty in his personal beliefs he will still sign every death order that crossed his desk (of course, his support of that statement is debatable, but that’s another thread). If he had tried to stick to his convictions, he’d have had a snowball’s chance in hell of getting elected governor in Virginia… we love ourselves a good hangin’ almost as much as them Texans. [/quote] I’m well aware of this as I also live in Virginia myself, and that is part of what made me think about how I, personally, would handle such issues. To be honest, I think if the choice is, “passionately try and speak out against the death penalty” or “shut up and accept the things I can’t change” with the first choice meaning no chance at election and the other giving me a fighting chance, I’d take the second chance. Like I said, I hope that to some level the people we have running for governorships feel like they can improve their state and make it a better place, and if you genuinely feel that way you shouldn’t give up on trying to do those things by taking an absolutist and intractable position on an issue that you simply lack the power to effect change. ---
**Author:** ![Martin\_Hyde](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/47e85d/32.png) [@Martin\_Hyde](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martin_Hyde)\ **Post date:** [November 24, 2006, 11:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-pardon-saves-two-lives/381551/67 "2006-11-24T23:47:36Z")
[QUOTE=Bricker] But a governor is different. The law clearly states that he has the power to pardon or commute under certain circumstances – in Texas, of course, that power is not unilateral; in other states, it is. Just as the legislators are correctly excercising their roles if they pass laws outlawing the deat penalty, the governor is correctly exercising his role if he pardons or commutes sentences in accord with his own discretion. It’s true that by doing this, he may thwart the will of the populace – but the populace has a remedy: they may remove him from office. Ask Gray Davis how effective that remedy can be. A governor is also corrrectly executing his role if he chooses never to pardon anyone, confident that the death penalty is legally and morally being applied correctly. That’s the perk of being elected as the chief executive – you get to wield that authority. [/QUOTE] Executives (both governors and the President) have a lot of executive powers that I think tradition and common sense tell us are not intended to be used without restraint. I think that the executive pardon arose out of the ability that monarchs used to have to pardon persons in extraordinary circumstances, usually in cases where justice clearly was not served or other special circumstances. Obviously, just like monarchs did, many Presidents abuse that pardon power (Clinton did so notoriously at the end of his Presidency–and many Presidents seem to have last-hour pardons the day they leave office.) I think that while there is clear precedent for unlimited use of pardons by the execute without cause, that the tradition of the executive pardon suggests it was intended to be used to correct extraordinary errors or faults or to deal with very extraordinary situations, not to be used exhaustively as a policy tool. ---
**Author:** ![Blaster\_Master](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/cab0a1/32.png) [@Blaster\_Master](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blaster_Master)\ **Post date:** [November 24, 2006, 11:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-pardon-saves-two-lives/381551/68 "2006-11-24T23:52:44Z")
[QUOTE=wring] So, for argument’s sake wrt Bush and his DP record in TX, the cases submitted for shouldn’t include those cases where actual innocence was alledged (as I pointed out, god, we’d **hope** that those folks would have something better than LWOP), but where there is some other reason to spare the persons life. REdeamtion being one potential. you obviously disagree that redemtion should be a used to commute the DP, but it does appear to be one of the legitimate claims. [/QUOTE] As I suspected, this was a largely a misunderstanding of your point from my perspective; my apologies. While I still do not agree that reformation or redemption is necessarily sufficient grounds for commuting the death penalty, I do find that far more palatable than releasing him. I am willing to accept that on the condition it is done only in a small number of cases under special cirumstances and not as the norm (which tends to be the case, as I understand). ---
**Author:** ![wring](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/838e76/32.png) [@wring](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wring)\ **Post date:** [November 25, 2006, 12:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-pardon-saves-two-lives/381551/69 "2006-11-25T00:02:52Z")
[QUOTE=Blaster Master] . I am willing to accept that on the condition it is done only in a small number of cases under special cirumstances and not as the norm (which tends to be the case, as I understand). [/QUOTE] I don’t believe that commutation of DP sentences is at all common. ---
**Author:** ![Blaster\_Master](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/cab0a1/32.png) [@Blaster\_Master](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Blaster_Master)\ **Post date:** [November 25, 2006, 12:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-pardon-saves-two-lives/381551/70 "2006-11-25T00:06:05Z")
[QUOTE=Martin Hyde] I’m well aware of this as I also live in Virginia myself, and that is part of what made me think about how I, personally, would handle such issues. To be honest, I think if the choice is, “passionately try and speak out against the death penalty” or “shut up and accept the things I can’t change” with the first choice meaning no chance at election and the other giving me a fighting chance, I’d take the second chance. Like I said, I hope that to some level the people we have running for governorships feel like they can improve their state and make it a better place, and if you genuinely feel that way you shouldn’t give up on trying to do those things by taking an absolutist and intractable position on an issue that you simply lack the power to effect change. [/QUOTE] It had me thinking similarly; however, it is difficult for me to consider the decision, as most of my objections to state law, were I to run for governor, would be from a political perspective as opposed to a moral one. As stated in a previous post, I think were I inclined to attempt to change the law to stand for my morals, running for governor is not the best platform for legislative change. > [@](#): > > Executives (both governors and the President) have a lot of executive powers that I think tradition and common sense tell us are not intended to be used without restraint. I think that the executive pardon arose out of the ability that monarchs used to have to pardon persons in extraordinary circumstances, usually in cases where justice clearly was not served or other special circumstances. Obviously, just like monarchs did, many Presidents abuse that pardon power (Clinton did so notoriously at the end of his Presidency–and many Presidents seem to have last-hour pardons the day they leave office.) I think that while there is clear precedent for unlimited use of pardons by the execute without cause, that the tradition of the executive pardon suggests it was intended to be used to correct extraordinary errors or faults or to deal with very extraordinary situations, not to be used exhaustively as a policy tool. It looks like you did a more elloquent job of voicing essentially the same object I had. ---
**Author:** ![Eutychus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/a3d4f5/32.png) [@Eutychus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eutychus)\ **Post date:** [November 25, 2006, 2:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-pardon-saves-two-lives/381551/71 "2006-11-25T14:02:04Z")
This has got to be the stupidest pit thread ever. The minute that I begin to equate the photo-op and traditional pardon of a Thanksgving turkey with the death penalty for convictec criminals is the minute that you can strap me down to that gurney because my intelligence will be pretty much shot by that point. ---
**Author:** ![Squink](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b5e925/32.png) [@Squink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Squink)\ **Post date:** [November 25, 2006, 2:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-pardon-saves-two-lives/381551/72 "2006-11-25T14:44:05Z")
[QUOTE=Eutychus] The minute that I begin to equate the photo-op and traditional pardon of a Thanksgving turkey with the death penalty for convicted criminals… [/QUOTE] The criminals, “[bred for their meaty breasts, quickly grow too heavy to move themselves around, and usually die before the next Thanksgiving.](http://blogs.wsj.com/washwire/2006/11/22/kinder-and-gentler-for-white-house-turkey-maybe-not/)” ---
**Author:** ![Eutychus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/a3d4f5/32.png) [@Eutychus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eutychus)\ **Post date:** [November 25, 2006, 2:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-pardon-saves-two-lives/381551/73 "2006-11-25T14:46:30Z")
[QUOTE=Squink] The criminals, “[bred for their meaty breasts, quickly grow too heavy to move themselves around, and usually die before the next Thanksgiving.](http://blogs.wsj.com/washwire/2006/11/22/kinder-and-gentler-for-white-house-turkey-maybe-not/)” [/QUOTE] I’m sure you have a point here, but I’ll be damned if I can see what it is. ---
**Author:** ![Walloon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/fbc32d/32.png) [@Walloon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Walloon)\ **Post date:** [November 25, 2006, 3:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-pardon-saves-two-lives/381551/74 "2006-11-25T15:31:38Z")
[QUOTE=Boyo Jim] You interpret it as: the governor has the power to grant pardons and reprieves if a majority of the parole board reccommends it. I interpret it as: the governor has the power to grant pardons and reprieves, only after reviewing a written recommendation from the parole board. [/QUOTE] Well, you interpret it wrongly. The originating power to reprieve, commute, or pardon a criminal sentence belongs to the pardon and parole board, not to the governor. If the board votes to grant one of those to a criminal, the governor has the power to veto the recommendation. But the governor cannot unilaterally commute or pardon a sentence without the board’s prior approval. The governor can only grant one 30-day reprieve of a sentence on his own. ---
**Author:** ![wring](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/838e76/32.png) [@wring](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wring)\ **Post date:** [November 25, 2006, 4:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-pardon-saves-two-lives/381551/75 "2006-11-25T16:02:50Z")
[QUOTE=Walloon] Well, you interpret it wrongly. The originating power to reprieve, commute, or pardon a criminal sentence belongs to the pardon and parole board, not to the governor. If the board votes to grant one of those to a criminal, the governor has the power to veto the recommendation. But the governor cannot unilaterally commute or pardon a sentence without the board’s prior approval. The governor can only grant one 30-day reprieve of a sentence on his own. [/QUOTE] did you miss himadmittimg he was wrong in post #65 above? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bush-pardon-saves-two-lives/381551.md?page=3)