Death Penalty For Rebellious Children? Arkansas Republican Charlie Fuqua Endorses It

Fuqua’s call for disrespectful children to be “permanently removed from society” in his 2012 book “God’s Law: The Only Political Solution.” It is the same book in which the would-be lawmaker promoted that Muslims be removed from America in order to solve the nation’s “Muslim problem.”

Fuqua's book website describes him as a conservative Christian lawyer. His controversial statements were first reported by the Arkansas Times.

Here’s what Fuqua wrote in the book:

“The maintenance of civil order in society rests on the foundation of family discipline. Therefore, a child who disrespects his parents must be permanently removed from society in a way that gives an example to all other children of the importance of respect for parents. The death penalty for rebellious children is not something to be taken lightly. The guidelines for administering the death penalty to rebellious children are given in Deut 21:18-21:

This passage does not give parents blanket authority to kill their children. They must follow the proper procedure in order to have the death penalty executed against their children. I cannot think of one instance in the Scripture where parents had their child put to death. Why is this so? Other than the love Christ has for us, there is no greater love then [sic] that of a parent for their child. The last people who would want to see a child put to death would be the parents of the child. Even so, the Scripture provides a safe guard to protect children from parents who would wrongly exercise the death penalty against them. Parents are required to bring their children to the gate of the city. The gate of the city was the place where the elders of the city met and made judicial pronouncements. In other words, the parents were required to take their children to a court of law and lay out their case before the proper judicial authority, and let the judicial authority determine if the child should be put to death. I know of many cases of rebellious children, however, I cannot think of one case where I believe that a parent had given up on their child to the point that they would have taken their child to a court of law and asked the court to rule that the child be put to death. Even though this procedure would rarely be used, if it were the law of land, it would give parents authority. Children would know that their parents had authority and it would be a tremendous incentive for children to give proper respect to their parents.”

A request to Fuqua for a comment, via telephone and email, has not been answered yet.

Fuqua, who served in the Arkansas House once before, from 1996 to 1998, is running against incumbent Democratic Rep. James McLean in House District 63.

However, with the presidential election less than a month away and GOP presidential nominee Mitt Romney leading President Barack Obama in some polls, Republicans have been distancing themselves from party extremists such as Fuqua and Arkansas Rep. Jon Hubbard, who wrote that slavery was a “blessing in disguise” for black people.

U.S. Rep. Tim Griffin, a Republican from Arkansas, told the Associated Press that “statements of Hubbard and Fuqua are ridiculous, outrageous and have no place in the civil discourse of either party.”

Fuqua told the news organization over the weekend that he wasn’t aware he was targeted by his own party.

“I think my views are fairly well-accepted by most people,” he said.