Join me for a moment at San Quentin. I’ll tell about the first time I attended an execution vigil there and why I will be there again Monday, Dec. 12 to protest the planned midnight execution of Stanley “Tookie” Williams.
I live in Larkspur, home of many one-of-a-kind destinations: gourmet restaurants, redwood groves and the state’s one and only death row. San Quentin — California’s exclusive facility for carrying out capital punishment — is in my back yard.
My daily work commute to San Francisco is by the Larkspur ferry. If you’ve ever taken it, you know that every morning and every evening, you get close enough to San Quentin to make out individual inmates in the exercise yard. One such evening, I happened to see the newspaper notice that an execution was scheduled for that night. On the next morning’s ferry, I read the details of the killing and the attendant vigil.
So we killed a man, and I just slept through it. This did not sit well. Capital punishment was not a big issue for me, but taking a life is serious. As someone who never liked “chicken hawks” (people willing to send others off to war but not willing to pick up a gun themselves) I was uncomfortable knowing that my state employees were killing someone in my name, in my hometown. Now I was the chicken hawk.
At the next execution, I was there. Starting at about 8 p.m., hundreds of people gathered just outside the prison gates. Most carried white wooden crosses, some sat in silent Buddhist meditation, a few joined an Indian drumming circle and others huddled under signs bearing the name of their church, singing hymns and keeping warm. I would characterize the overall feeling as reverent. It wasn’t noisy like a protest. It was a respectful vigil.
There were no Jewish signs, banners or speakers. A priest came to the microphone and reminded us that the Catholic Church officially opposes the death penalty and then led a prayer for the guards and executioners. A former inmate spoke about life inside and the hope of redemption. Lawyers for the condemned man read us his final statements.
At midnight, Rabbi Alan Lew was invited to the front. He read into the P.A. system the name of every man who had died in the execution chamber with the same solemnity you hear at shul when the yahrzeit list is read. Then he read the names of all whom they had murdered. The second list was much longer, a shuddering reminder of the real suffering caused by these men.
Then, in sync with the actual execution, Lew led this congregation of Catholics, Protestants and Buddhists in the Mourner’s Kaddish. I detected a few dozen voices scattered throughout the assemblage who clearly knew the prayer. Later, I asked the rabbi why he was there. Did he oppose capital punishment because it discriminates against poor or minority defendants? Was he concerned about prosecutors or police faking evidence to get convictions? Was it because of the taxpayers’ cost of appeals and the average 16 years inmates spend waiting on death row for their execution?
He looked at me like you look at the foolish child at a seder, and said, “It’s just wrong.”
Of course, we Jews don’t have to agree with our rabbis, and there are some Jews who do not oppose the death penalty.
Since then, I have learned more about the Jewish view on capital punishment. Google around and you’ll discover that Israel, with all its terrorist mass murderers, does not use capital punishment. The only execution in Israel was Adolf Eichmann’s, in 1962, for his war crimes as an SS officer. You’ll find out that the rabbis of the Talmud so opposed capital punishment that they created procedural ways to almost completely avoid imposing it. Rabbis Akiba and Tarfon said, “If we had been members of the Sanhedrin, no defendant would ever have been executed.”
You’ll also learn that Rabbi Akiba himself was a victim of capital punishment. The Romans executed him 100 years after they did the same to Jesus.
If you come to San Quentin this month, look for the big Jewish star bearing these words from the diary of Anne Frank: “In spite of everything I still believe that people are really good at heart. I simply can’t build up my hopes on a foundation consisting of confusion, misery and death.” I’ll be standing under it.
Ken Kramarz is a member of the Death Penalty Task Force of Congregation Rodef Sholom and lives in Larkspur.