Table Of ContentPain, Death, and the Law
Law, Meaning, and Violence
ThescopeofLaw,Meaning,andViolenceisdefinedbythewide-rangingscholarly
debatessignaledbyeachofthewordsinthetitle.Thosedebateshavetakenplace
amongandbetweenlawyers,anthropologists,politicaltheorists,sociologists,and
historians,aswellasliteraryandculturalcritics.Thisseriesisintendedtorecognize
theimportanceofsuchongoingconversationsaboutlaw,meaning,andviolenceas
wellastoencourageand furtherthem.
SeriesEditors:
MarthaMinow,HarvardLawSchool
ElaineScarry,HarvardUniversity
AustinSarat,AmherstCollege
Narrative, Violence,andtheLaw:The EssaysofRobertCover,
editedbyMarthaMinow,MichaelRyan,andAustinSarat
Narrative,Authority,andLaw,byRobinWest
ThePossibilityofPopularJustice:ACaseStudyofConl111unityMediation in the United
States,editedbySallyEngleMerryandNealMilner
LegalModernism,byDavidLuban
Surveillance, Privacy,andtheLaw: EmployeeDrugTestingandthePoliticsofSocialControl,
byJohnGilliom
LivesofLawyers:Journeys in theOrganizationsofPractice,byMichaelJ.Kelly
UnleashingRights:Law,Meaning, andtheAnil11a1RightsMovement,byHelenaSilverstein
LawStories,editedbyGaryBellowandMarthaMinow
ThePowersThat Punish:PrisonandPoliticsin theEraofthe"BigHouse," 1920-1955,
byCharlesBright
LawandthePostnlOdernMind: EssaysonPsychoanalysisandJurisprudence,
editedbyPeterGoodrichandDavidGrayCarlson
Russia'sLegalFictions,byHarrietMurav
StrangerstotheLaw:GayPeopleonTrial,byLisaKeenandSuzanneB.Goldberg
Butterfly,theBride:Essayson Law,Narrative,andtheFamily,byCarolWeisbrod
ThePoliticsofComnlunityPolicing:RearrangingthePowertoPunish,byWilliamLyons
LawsofthePostcolonial,editedbyEveDarian-SmithandPeterFitzpatrick
WhisperedConsolations: LawandNarrativeinAfricanAmericanLife,
byJon-ChristianSuggs
BadBoys:PublicSchoolsin theMakingofBlackMasculinity,byAnnArnettFerguson
Pain,Death,andtheLaw,editedbyAustinSarat
Pain, Death, and the Law
Edited by
Austin Sarat
AnnArbor
THE UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN PREss
Copyright©bytheUniversityofMichigan2001
Allrightsreserved
PublishedintheUnitedStatesofAmericaby
TheUniversityofMichiganPress
ManufacturedintheUnitedStatesofAmerica
@Printedonacid-freepaper
2004 2003 2002 2001 432 1
Nopartofthispublicationmaybereproduced,storedinaretrievalsystem,
ortransmittedinanyformorbyanymeans,electronic,mechanical,or
otherwise,withoutthewrittenpermissionofthepublisher.
A elPcatalogrecordfor thisbookisavailablefrom theBritishLibrary.
LibraryofCongressCataloging-in-PublicationData
Pain,death,andthelaw / editedbyAustinSarat.
p. cm.- (Law,meaning,andviolence)
ISBN0-472-09767-9(cloth:acid-freepaper)- ISBN0-472-06767-2
(paper:acid-freepaper)
1.Capitalpunishment-UnitedStates. 2.Body,Human-Lawand
legislation-UnitedStates. 3.Pain-Socialaspects. I.Sarat,
Austin. II.Series.
KF9227·C2P35 2001
345·73'0773-dc21 00-012320
Contents
Introduction: OnPainand DeathasFactsof
LegalLife 1
Austin Sarat
TheProblemofPaininPunishment:
HistoricalPerspectives
Karl Shoemaker
KillingMeSoftly: CapitalPunishmentand the
TechnologiesforTakingLife 43
AustinSarat
WhattheLawMustNotHear: OnCapital
Punishmentand theVoice ofPain
Timothy V. Kaufman-Osborn
TheSacredNameofPain: TheRoleofVictim
ImpactEvidenceinDeathPenalty
SentencingDecisions 103
Jennifer L. Culbert
TheProblemofPainandtheRightto Die 137
ShaiJ. Lavi
Contributors
Index
Introduction: On Pain and
Death as Facts of Legal Life
Austin Sarat
[T]helawrevealsitselfforwhatitis:lessthecommandthathas
deathasitssanction,thandeathitselfwearingtheface oflaw....
Thelawkills. Deathisalwaysthehorizonofthelaw:ifyoudothis,
youwilldie.
-MauriceBlanchot(The StepNot Beyond,24-25)
"Legalinterpretationplaysona field ofpainand death." Theseare the
wordswithwhichRobertCoverbegan"ViolenceandtheWord."lThat
essaywas designed to reorient legal theory, or at least to remind legal
scholarseagerlypursuingtheinterpretiveturnortheparallelsbetween
law and literature ofthebase materiality ofthe legal enterprise. While
Cover's work is now regarded as something of a classic in contempo
rarylegalthought,2surprisinglyfew scholarshave takenuphis invita
tion to explore the intimate connections among pain, death, and the
law) The scholarship collected here is intended to serve as something
ofa correctivetothatfact. Itputspainand deathatthecenterofthink-
1.RobertCover,"ViolenceandtheWord,"YaleLawJournal95(1986):1601.
2. AsJonathanSimonputs it, "Cover's 'Violence and the Word' stillhaunts us a
decadelaterinpartbecauseitsoundedsuchadissonantnoteintheintellectualtrendsof
itstime....Thegreatvalueof'ViolenceandtheWord'ispreciselyinitsalarminginsis
tencethatlaw'sviolencebeacknowledged,notjustattheextremitiesofthelegalorder,
butatthecenteroftheprocessinjudicialinterpretation."See"TheVicissitudesofLaw's
Violence,"typescript,1998,10.
).ForexceptionsseeAustinSaratandThomasR.Kearns,"AJourneythroughFor
getting: Toward aJurisprudence ofViolence," in The Fate ofLaw, ed. AustinSaratand
ThomasR.Kearns(AnnArbor:UniversityofMichiganPress,1991);andDesmondMan
derson,ed.CourtingDeath:TheLawofMortality(London:PlutoPress,1999).
2 PAIN, DEATH, AND THE LAW
ing about law, highlighting the way law imagines the body in pain as
wellasthewaypainand deathbecomejurisprudentialfacts.
AsCovercorrectlyobserved,despitetheirundeniablesignificance,
painanddeathhaveplayedlittlerole,andoccupiedlittlespace,inlegal
theoryandjurisprudence.4Or,whentheyarepresent,awarenessofthe
painordeathdone,orauthorized,byofficialsaredivorcedfromactsof
interpretation, as if the act of speaking or writing the words of law
couldbeseparatedfrom theinscriptionofthosewordsonthebodiesof
citizens.5By failing to confrontlaw's lethal character and the masking
of its interpretive violence, legal theory tacitly encourages officials to
ignorethebloodyconsequencesoftheirauthoritativeactsandthepain
thoseactsproduce. Moreover,byequatingtheconditionsoflegallegit
imacy with that masking, much of legal theory promotes righteous
indifferenceandallowspainanddeathtoproceedunabated. Law,sur
rounded by so much pain and death, is, nonetheless, able to maintain
itscalm,bureaucraticfacade.
Neither traditional nor critical jurisprudence have truly come to
terms with the fact that the business of law, when everything else is
saidanddone,isapainful,oftendeadlyone,thatlegalinterpretationis
frequently aprefaceto theuse ofphysicalforce, and thatlawtrafficsin
pain and death with such cool efficiency. The pain and death that law
dispenses are generally invisible in both what might be called law's
"officialstory," andmanyofitscriticalcounternarratives.6
In law's officialstoryjudgesarebound, more or less tightly, com
pelled, more or less directly, by its rules and the only accountability
that is demanded is accountability within the terms of those rules?
Thatstoryquietsthepainanddeathinwhichlawdealsthroughitsself
proclaimed, neutral concern with rules and rule following. As Olive
cronaputsit,
4.Cover,"ViolenceandtheWord."SeealsoTomDumm,"TheFearofLaw,"Stud
iesinLazu,Politics,andSociety10(1990):29.
5.Coverhimselfdivorcesinterpretationfromviolenceasifthelatterweremerelya
matterofimplementationoradefectofadministration.See"ViolenceandtheWord."
6.Itistrue,ofcourse,thatviolenceandlawhavesometimesbeentiedtogetherina
definitionalsense.SeeAlfRoss,OnLawandJustice(BerkeleyandLosAngeles:University
ofCaliforniaPress,1959),34;HansKelsen,GeneralTheoryofLawandState,trans.Anders
Wedberg(NewYork:RussellandRussell,1945);NobertoBobbio,"Law&Force,"Monist
48(1965):321.
7.ForadiscussionofthisviewseeRobertFerguson,"TheJudicialOpinionasaLit
eraryGenre,"YaleJournalofLazvandtheHumanities 2(1990):201.
INTRODUCTION 3
Actualviolenceis ... keptverymuchin thebackground....Such
astateofthingsisapttocreatethebeliefthatviolenceisalientothe
law, orofsecondaryimportance. This is, however, a fatal illusion.
. . . [Law's] real character is largely obscured and this is done by
meansofmetaphysicalideasandexpressions.Itisnotbluntlysaid,
e.g. that the function ofthe courts is to determine the use offorce.
Instead their function is said to be the"administration ofjustice"
ortheascertainingof"rights" and "duties."B
Law's official story traditionally hasbeen preoccupied with law's
majestyratherthanitsmonstrousness,9withitsvalue-declaring,rights
lO
enhancing,community-buildingaspects ratherthanits"monopolyof
legitimate violence."ll Ithas failed to take seriously the fact that those
whocontrolanddispensepainanddeathandthoseagainstwhomthey
dispenseit
undergo achingly disparate ... experiences. For the ... [former],
... pain and fear are remote, unreal and largely unshared. They
are, therefore, almost never made part ofthe interpretive artifact,
such as the judicial opinion. On the other hand, for those who
impose the violence, the justification is important, real and care
fullycultivated. Conversely,for thevictim,thejustificationfor the
8. See Karl Olivecrona, Lawas Fact (Copenhagen: Einer Munksgaard, 1939), 125
and 127.ForanexceptionseeJusticeHolmes'sopinioninAmericanBananaCo. v. United
FruitCo., 213U.S.347,356(1908).Holmessaid,"Lawisastatementofcircumstancesin
whichthepublicforcewillbebroughttobearuponmanthroughthecourts."However,
asMinow,argues,"[nudgesandtoplevelbureaucratsdonothavetoseeviolence.Their
jobsarestructuredsoviolencehappenswelldownthechainofcommand,andtheyoften
havenopointofreferenceforacknowledgingtheviolencetheyhearothersdescribe."See
MarthaMinow,"WordsandtheDoortotheLandofChange:Law,Language,andFam
ilyViolence,"typescript,1990,14.
9.MichelFoucaultarguesthatinpoliticalandlegaltheory"theKingremainsthe
central personage in the whole legal edifice of the West." See Power/Knowledge, trans.
ColinGordon,LeoMarshall,JohnMepham,andKateSoper(NewYork:Pantheon,1980),
94·
10.SeeRobertCover,"NomosandNarrative,"HarvardLawReview97(1983):4.
11. Thephrase"themonopolyoflegitimateviolence" isusedbyMaxWeber. See
FromMaxWeber:EssaysinSociology,ed.andtrans.H.H.GerthandC.WrightMills(New
York:OxfordUniversityPress,1946),78.SeealsoRudolphvonIhering,LawasaMeansto
anEnd(Boston:BostonBooks,1913),230-46.
