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Letters: Jul. 7, 1997

SHOULD HE DIE?

"It is essential to our own peace of mind that we be able to forgive Timothy McVeigh. And he can most easily be forgiven if he is dead." KANE MCADAMS Scituate, Mass.

You said that it might be best if Timothy McVeigh were not executed [CRIME AND PUNISHMENT, June 16], "to deny him his bid for martyrdom, to keep him earthbound and watch him slowly wither...just another old jailbird shuffling around his cell." But McVeigh will never be a martyr in the truest sense of the word, which comes from the Greek word for witness. It connotes one...

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