On January 11, 2003, Illinois Governor George Ryan--a Republican on
record as saying that "some crimes are so horrendous . . . that society
has a right to demand the ultimate penalty"--commuted the capital
sentences of all 167 prisoners on his state's death row. Critics
demonized Ryan. For opponents of capital punishment, however, Ryan
became an instant hero whose decision was seen as a signal moment in the
"new abolitionist" politics to end killing by the state.
In this compelling and timely work, Austin Sarat provides the first
book-length work on executive clemency. He turns our focus from
questions of guilt and innocence to the very meaning of mercy. Starting
from Ryan's controversial decision, Mercy on Trial uses the lens of
executive clemency in capital cases to discuss the fraught condition of
mercy in American political life. Most pointedly, Sarat argues that
mercy itself is on trial. Although it has always had a problematic
position as a form of "lawful lawlessness," it has come under much more
intense popular pressure and criticism in recent decades. This has
yielded a radical decline in the use of the power of chief executives to
stop executions.
From the history of capital clemency in the twentieth century to
surrounding legal controversies and philosophical debates about when (if
ever) mercy should be extended, Sarat examines the issue
comprehensively. In the end, he acknowledges the risks associated with
mercy--but, he argues, those risks are worth taking.
