EUGENE VOLOKH: “I am being perfectly serious, by the way. I like civilization, but some forms of savagery deserve to be met not just with cold, bloodless justice but with the deliberate infliction of pain, with cruel vengeance rather than with supposed humaneness or squeamishness. I think it slights the burning injustice of the murders, and the pain of the families, to react in any other way.”

The notion that civilization equals squeamishness is not supported by history.

UPDATE: According to Jon Henke, Volokh sounds downright Jeffersonian.

ANOTHER UPDATE: Notorious Gandhi-quoting liberal Clayton Cramer is disgusted by Volokh’s comments.