‘Proper Role as a Judge’
Like Moore, I would not normally welcome an opportunity for Gov. George Deukmejian to fill Rose Bird’s seat on the Supreme Court. And, again like Moore, there are far more of her judicial decisions with which I agree than I disagree.
But her unrelenting and unyielding obstinacy against capital punishment has tilted the scales, and now I would welcome her departure from the bench.
For Rose Bird and The Times and others against capital punishment, it’s easy to sit on Mount Olympus and look down and declare that it’s no better for the state to murder than it is for the murderer to murder. But their smug smiles might start to crack a little were they to wake up and find Charles Manson and his clan living next door to their daughter, Sirhan B. Sirhan in the downstairs apartment, Dan White sweeping up hair at the neighborhood barber shop, and other “rehabilitated” murderers driving taxis, mowing lawns, parking cars.
However much one may detest executing murderers, there are simply too many instances where murderers, released or escaped, have killed again. In other words, by refusing to execute murderers, we have allowed them, in case after documented case, to go out and kill even more innocent people. Thinking they can be rehabilitated is about as realistic as sending rabid dogs to obedience school.
RONALD D. HARDCASTLE
Los Angeles
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