Pfizer Inc. — the pharmaceutical giant — has taken a bold stance against the use of its drugs for executions, one that will please many progressive opponents of the death penalty.
The drug company announced the following policy: If a government agency wants Pfizer to supply it with drugs of kinds sometimes used in (or considered for use in) lethal injections, it will have to certify that it is buying the drugs for medical, not punitive, use, and that it won’t resell them. Pfizer also said it will “act upon findings that reveal noncompliance.”
Thus, in practical terms, the policy will function as a ban on the use of Pfizer drugs in executions.
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The company’s act is being hailed as a brave one. But it should be noted, this is an act of corporate conscience.
That means corporations can have a conscience and therefore rights to freedom of thought and expression.
With Pfizer’s decision, every one of the roughly 25 companies approved by the FDA to make these drugs has established a policy to stop their use in executions, according to Reprieve, an advocacy group opposed to capital punishment. That makes it difficult for states committed to lethal injection to carry out executions. While Texas, which executes more people than any other state, has found a compounding pharmacy to provide the drugs secretly, Ohio has already had to delay executions. This state has more than 100 inmates on death row — and no drugs to carry out their sentences.
What Pfizer is doing is refusing to cooperate with the clear public policy of 27 states and the federal government, a policy Gallup says a majority of Americans support, a policy that is soundly justified.
But, if being an American means anything, it means standing up for what you believe in — even when the government and the electorate disagree.
Pfizer’s statement is an affirmation of the values that animate its business. Pfizer is in the healing business; its mission is to save lives and enhance them. To use Pfizer’s drugs to put people to death is to use what Pfizer created for a purpose that is the opposite of Pfizer’s mission. Pfizer’s stance is an act of integrity — an act of fidelity to Pfizer’s values.
So yes, corporations such as Pfizer can have values. They may be the values of major shareholders, executives, or other key employees. They may be, as seems to be the case here, values that shape the company’s work. And for those who live those values through their work for the corporation, they can be as meaningful as the values they live at home and at political meetings.
The freedom to act on one’s own belief is most relevant when evaluating the belief and action of someone who disagrees with you. That’s when it’s clearest that you are honoring the other person’s freedom of thought, not just what you happen to think is right. In this case, the values Pfizer is acting on concern its own function as a business, not the question of capital punishment as a matter of public policy.
Those progressives who celebrate Pfizer’s policy because they oppose the death penalty should take heed. What they are applauding is a decision by a corporation to act on its own values, even though those values are (at least) in tension with public policy in some states.
If all moral issues were to be resolved by government, it would be proper for the federal government and the governments of those states that have capital punishment to compel Pfizer to provide drugs. It is obvious that this would be wrong, and it would be wrong because of the violence it would do to conscience.
Those who applaud Pfizer’s decision and are glad it is free to make it should respect the right of other businesses — like Hobby Lobby and Chick-fil-A — to speak and act according to their values.
First Published May 20, 2016, 4:00 a.m.
