There are various arguments for the death penalty from deterrence to retribution to efficiency to morality. However, Sen. Lynn Hutchings, R-Cheyenne, offered a particularly unique defense: if it was good enough for Jesus, the death penalty is good enough for everyone else.
The Wyoming Senate voted on Thursday 12-18 to defeat a bill to repeal the state’s death penalty. In the debate, Hutchings made her Christian based appeal for capital punishment:
“The greatest man who ever lived died via the death penalty for you and me. I’m grateful to him for our future hope because of this. Governments were instituted to execute justice. If it wasn’t for Jesus dying via the death penalty, we would all have no hope.”
It is not clear if Hutchings believes that the death penalty might produce more divine figures or capital punishment is now divinely ordained.
A poll showed that 73 percent of white evangelical Protestants supported the death penalty; while the number goes down to 61 percent for white mainline Protestants. That number falls again for Catholics who support the death penalty at 52 percent.