The end of the death penalty?

What the Troy Davis case means for capital punishment. Dahlia Lithwick writes:

Start with the fact that the Troy Davis case has created staggering levels of public interest in the death penalty. (Jeff Toobin called Davis was "the best-known person on death row" and that no death penalty case has engendered this much public doubt and outrage since the execution of Julius and Ethel Rosenberg, killed in 1953 for spying for the Soviet Union.) It is probably folly to try to understand why one death penalty case captures the public imagination more than any other. But the Davis case illustrates so many of the growing doubts about the capital system, such as questions about the reliability of eyewitness testimony, the grotesque levels of racial bias that infect the capital sentencing system, and the various types of police misconduct. 

I've made my views on the death penalty fairly clear as of late. To impose a permanent, irreversible punishment in the absence of utter certainty undermines the basic principles by which we conduct ourselves morally. The Davis case seems to mark a great shift in public opinion, in an age when we appear to be increasingly aware of our own faults. And yet, some still cheer at the notion of execution. What a world this is.

(Image: "Michael Henry and other protesters for Troy Davis gather on the steps of the Georgia Capitol building, Sept. 20, 2011 in Atlanta." Jessica McGowan/Getty Images, via ABC News.)