At the LWVUS convention in 2006, delegates voted to adopt the following position: “The LWVUS supports abolition of the death penalty.” This position was recommended by the LWVUS Board of Directors for adoption by concurrence with the LWV Illinois position, Death Penalty Abolition. The following pros and cons were offered:

Arguments that support an abolition position:

·    The death penalty is inherently flawed and no amount of reform can make it an appropriate sentencing option anywhere.

·    The flaws in the death penalty are so many and so deep that any League which engages in a study of the death penalty will inevitably reach the same conclusion.

·  As of November 2008, more than 100 persons on various state death rows had been wrongfully convicted and subsequently exonerated. The fact that our criminal justice systems will execute or are executing innocent people lends urgency to the adoption of an abolition position.

Arguments that oppose an abolition position:

·    The death penalty is justified as punishment for those who commit heinous crimes.

·    The death penalty serves as a deterrent to violent crime. Without a death penalty, murder rates would soar.

·    Only the death penalty provides closure for families of murder victims.

Unfortunately this vote put the LWV-Texas in an awkward position, as we already had a state position on the death penalty. We adopted our study in 2001, and our position in 2003. Our position specifies, “provide the option of life without parole, in addition to execution and life imprisonment, to juries in capital cases.” Additionally we want to “establish a moratorium on all executions in Texas while an official study of the capital punishment system is conducted.” Life without parole was subsequently passed by the legislature in 2005, but a bill asking for a moratorium on executions did not pass in 2007. With execution as part of our state position, we cannot lobby for the abolition of the death penalty in Texas.

Background: In January 2003, Governor Ryan of Illinois pardoned four inmates on death row and commuted the death sentences of 164 others to “Life Without Parole.” The death penalty had been reinstated in Illinois in 1977. In the years following, Illinois had had 12 executions and 13 exonerations.

Texas has long led the nation in the number of prisoners executed. In 2008, executions nationally were put on hold until the Supreme Court reached its decision on the legality of lethal injection as a method of execution. With approval of the method, Texas resumed executions with that of Karl Çhamberlain on June 11, 2008. The Texas Department of Criminal Justice has executed eleven persons as of October 16. Ten more executions are scheduled through November 20.

Dr. James Grigson, one of the psychiatrists employed by Texas, was expelled from the American Psychiatric Association for asserting that he could with 100% certainty predict which individuals would engage in future violent acts.

The so-called “modern era” of Texas executions began with that of Charlie Brooks on December 7, 1982, the first person put to death by lethal injection. Since that time, Texas has executed more than four hundred individuals (416 as of October 2008), far more than any other state.  Popular support for the death penalty remains high, though it has lowered somewhat since the option of life without parole can now be offered to juries. No one supports the execution of innocent people. Overall, 70 per cent of Americans oppose the execution of the mentally retarded.  The Supreme Court has decreed that persons under the age of 18 at the time of the crime may not be executed.

Though supporters of the death penalty maintain that it is a deterrent to crime, many statistical studies indicate that it has no measurable effect. It is unfairly applied among states and even among counties in the same state. Racial disparities remain in the use of the death penalty, with murderers of whites between four and five times as likely to be sentenced to death as murderers of blacks. Blacks have consistently made up about 40 per cent of the death row population while making up only about 12 per cent of the total population.

David R. Dow, professor of law at the University of Houston Law Center and founder and director of the Texas Innocence Network says, “The death penalty we have today is as arbitrary as it was a generation ago when the Supreme Court briefly condemned it as unconstitutional.” In its use of the death penalty, Texas is becoming something of an anomaly even in this country. Fourteen states now have no death penalty. An additional 21 states have not had an execution since January, 2007. Countries wishing to join the European Union must abolish the death penalty. China carries out over half the world’s executions each year, followed by Iraq, Iran, and Saudi Arabia.

LWV-Texas now faces a choice: Vote to delete the reference to execution from our state position, so that we may lobby for any bill opposing the death penalty. Or keep our position and only support bills for a moratorium on the death penalty. The death penalty issue is very important. Since only two members from each League can vote at the Lobby Day/Statewide meeting in March, we will consider the death penalty position at the next state Convention in 2010 when more voting members are in attendance. LWV-Texas will continue to support any legislation calling for a moratorium on capital punishment in the next session.   

Marjorie Loehlin, LWV-Texas