Kantian duty-based justification underpins modern death penalty advocacy

Evidence

Some advocates draw heavily on Immanuel Kant’s ideas on restitutive morality. As we saw earlier, Kant argued that society has a duty to execute those found guilty of the most serious crimes. In justifying the morality of capital punishment, advocates contend that if one accepts that punishment is legitimate and that the severity of punishment is proportionate to the gravity of the crime, then the death penalty is morally justified. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia put it succinctly: “You kill. You die. That’s fair” In reality, however, neither murder nor punishment is that definitive. — Albert Bandura, Moral Disengagement, 1887

Categorization

• QUESTION: Interesting: Bandura calls Kant’s view ‘restitutive’ morality, but Kant’s is usually labeled retributive — a possible terminological choice worth checking, or an error.