Joe Biden’s Moral Wisdom

This morning, the White House announced that President Joe Biden has commuted the sentences of 37 men on federal death row to life without parole. The historic move came shortly after a batch of pardons and commutations for hundreds of people convicted of nonviolent crimes, as well as Biden’s pardon of his own son. In his official statement, Biden emphasized that “I condemn these murderers, grieve for the victims of their despicable acts, and ache for all the families who have suffered unimaginable and irreparable loss.” But he said that his conscience and experience made him “more convinced than ever that we must stop the use of the death penalty at the federal level.”The political wisdom of Biden’s lame-duck pardons and commutation jubilee is unclear. It seems likely to me that Republicans will use the details of death-row prisoners’ crimes to tar Biden and the Democrats as vaguely approving of torture and murder. Biden himself seemed prepared for that eventuality in his statement, and the recriminations have already begun, despite the fact that life without parole is still a severe punishment: Fair enough; these prisoners’ crimes were to a person evil and left scores of families with holes in their lives. Nevertheless, the moral wisdom of Biden’s decision is compelling to me. Biden’s legacy may be tied up in allegations of corruption and the evident cover-up of his waning health, but he has also secured a place in history as a president of certain mercies, all of which speak of the restraint a sovereign owes his people.[Elizabeth Bruenig: In praise of mercy]Biden’s decision was a direct response to Donald Trump’s 2020 federal execution spree, wherein then–Attorney General Bill Barr directed the Federal Bureau of Prisons to resume executions after a 17-year hiatus, then oversaw the deaths of 13 prisoners in six months. Activists and advocates have recently focused on persuading the president to prevent another round of executions on Trump’s watch. In emailed remarks, Ruth Friedman, director of the Capital Federal Habeas Project, explained that “numerous groups and individuals representing a wide array of viewpoints have been calling on the President to take this important step,” adding that “there was also a formal clemency application process through the Office of the Pardon Attorney in many cases, and that process includes communications between the DOJ and a range of stakeholders on all sides of the case.” Among those urging Biden to commute these sentences were the American Civil Liberties Union, Equal Justice USA, the Innocence Project, the Catholic Mobilizing Network, and Pope Francis.Not every person on federal death row received a commutation. Those who did not were: Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, one of the Boston Marathon bombers of 2013; Robert Bowers, the 2018 Tree of Life synagogue shooter; and Dylann Roof, the gunman responsible for the 2015 Charleston, South Carolina, church massacre that left nine dead. Each case was related to terroristic violence and targeted mass murder. Despite Attorney General Merrick Garland imposing a moratorium on federal executions in 2021, lawyers representing the Department of Justice still defended these death sentences in court; in that respect, it was not surprising that Biden would leave them off of his commutation list. Still, their cases may be tied up in court for the duration of Trump’s term, meaning he will likely be unable to execute any of those three in the coming years.[Mark Osler: The forgotten tradition of clemency]The commutations will, then, effectively end the federal death penalty for a generation. “If you cannot end the death penalty legislatively, this is the way you end it in practice,” Robert Dunham, director of the Death Penalty Policy Project, told me. “Death-penalty abolitionists will have to hope that by the time the next set of cases makes it to death row and through the appeals process, that there’s a new Congress and a differently constituted Supreme Court that will take a serious look at the constitutionality and desirability of the death penalty.” Dunham added that Biden’s moral leadership could enable governors in the country weighing their own commutations, such as Governor Roy Cooper of North Carolina and Governor Gavin Newsom of California.The decision sparked relief and gratitude not only for the men of federal death row, but also for members of the public who had urged Biden to commute. Donnie Oliviero, a police officer from Columbus, Ohio, whose partner had been killed by Daryl Lawrence, one of the men whose sentence was commuted by Biden, said in a statement provided after the fact that “putting to death the person who killed my police partner and best friend would have brought me no peace. The President has done what is right here, and what is consistent with the faith he and I share. Thank you, Mr. President.” Gary Mohr, the former director of the Ohio Department of Corrections, added that he was “so grateful to President Biden for taking this step to ensure no federal correctional professionals will face the harm of participating in executions for the foreseeable future.” For these men, as well as scores of others both on the row and off, Biden has brought about a fraction of peace on Earth, a measure of mercy mild—and a welcome hallelujah.