Legislative Watch
Restore Justice: Abolish the Death Penalty
Recently
Passed Legislation
The United States is taking an increasingly
isolated stand for state-sponsored execution. We should punish
criminals, but not at the expense of our national traditions of justice
and equality.
by Russ Feingold
As we go forward into the 21st century, America has the opportunity
to write a new chapter in our pursuit of justice and equality by
abolishing the death penalty. It's time to question the assumptions that
the death penalty is an infallible sentence and a deterrent to
crime.
Last November, I invited Americans to face these important issues in
a new context by introducing U.S. Senate Bill 1917, legislation to
abolish the death penalty for all federal crimes.
The U.S. Supreme Court decided in 1976 that the death penalty was
constitutional. Since then, the use of capital punishment has
accelerated in our country while the rest of the world has increasingly
abandoned it. Since 1985 more than 35 countries have abolished the death
penalty or, having previously abolished it for ordinary crimes, have
abolished it for all crimes. In contrast, during 1999 the United States
set a new record for the number of executions in any one year since
1976: 98 death row inmates executed.
The federal government and the 38 states that allow the death penalty
could learn from Wisconsin's example. Wisconsin abolished the death
penalty in 1853. Yet, Wisconsin's murder rate was only 3.6 per 100,000
citizens in 1998, almost half the national murder rate. By comparison,
since 1976 Texas has been the most prodigious user of capital
punishment, carrying out 199 executions over the past 23 years. In 1998
the murder rate in Texas was 6.8 per 100,000 citizens, nearly double the
rate in Wisconsin. This data simply highlights what other data and
studies have concluded: The death penalty is ineffective as a deterrent
to crime.
Perhaps the death penalty's deepest flaw in practice is its role as
the endpoint of a fallible justice system. Since the 1970s, 85 people
have been freed from death row because they were later proven innocent.
To be applied fairly, the death penalty must be administered by a
justice system free of bias. But the facts raise a real possibility of
bias: 75 percent of the people on federal death row are members of
minority groups, and defendants who kill white victims are more likely
to receive the death penalty than defendants who kill black victims.
While sitting on our nation's highest court for more than 20 years,
Justices Blackmun and Powell were many times asked to pronounce the last
word on appeals of death sentences. They came to understand the
randomness and unfairness of the death penalty. In 1994 Justice Harry
Blackmun wrote that the death penalty experiment had failed because no
combination of procedural rules or substantive regulations ever can save
the death penalty from its inherent constitutional deficiencies. Justice
Lewis Powell also had a change of mind and in 1991 told his biographer
that he had decided that capital punishment should be abolished.
 U.S. Sen. Russ Feingold, Harvard
1979 with honors, sits on the Senate Judiciary Committee and is the
Ranking Member on the Judiciary Subcommittee on the Constitution,
Federalism, and Property Rights. |
Last December, Catholic and Jewish leaders launched a joint national
campaign to abolish the death penalty. They join leaders from many other
denominations and faiths that oppose the use of capital punishment. The
American Bar Association has called for a moratorium on its use, and a
moratorium has been considered by at least 10 state legislatures during
the last year. Illinois Governor Ryan recently placed a moratorium on
the death penalty there because so many death row inmates recently were
proved to be innocent.
These developments reflect a growing awareness that the United States
is taking an increasingly isolated stand for state-sponsored execution.
We should punish criminals, but not at the expense of our national
traditions of justice and equality. As we enter a new century in our
nation's proud history, it's time to recognize the death penalty as a
barbaric punishment that we should leave behind. It's time to pass U.S.
Senate Bill 1917, the Federal Death Penalty Abolition Act.
For more information, you can contact U.S. Senator Russ Feingold at
716 Hart Senate Office Building, Washington, DC, 20510.
Wisconsin Lawyer
