[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 153 (2007), Part 7]
[Senate]
[Page 10499]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                           THE DEATH PENALTY

  Mr. FEINGOLD. Mr. President, I firmly believe that the death penalty 
should be abolished, at all levels of government. Just a few months 
ago, I introduced the Federal Death Penalty Abolition Act of 2007 
toward that end. The bill would abolish the death penalty at the 
Federal level; it would put an immediate halt to executions and forbid 
the imposition of the death penalty as a sentence for violations of 
Federal law.
  I first introduced my bill in 1999, and since then only a few Members 
of the Senate have been willing to join me in this cause. Not too long 
ago, some believed that opposition to or criticism of the death penalty 
was politically dangerous. But times have changed. The American people 
are expressing greater and greater concerns about the death penalty. A 
May 2006 Gallup poll reported that for the first time, when given a 
choice between the two sentencing options, more Americans choose the 
sentence of life without parole than the death penalty. The American 
public understands that the death penalty raises serious and complex 
problems.
  Leaders across the country are publicly expressing their opposition 
to the death penalty--leaders such as Governor Corzine of New Jersey, 
Governor O'Malley of Maryland, and Governor Kaine of Virginia. State 
legislatures in Maryland, Montana, Nebraska, and New Mexico have all 
given serious consideration to abolition bills in the past 3 months 
alone. In fact, each of these four measures failed to move to the next 
step of the process by only one vote. In Maryland, an abolition bill 
failed to pass out of a Senate committee by one vote. In Montana, a 
bill to repeal the State's death penalty passed the senate and then 
failed by just one vote to move out of a house committee. In Nebraska, 
the unicameral legislature failed to move an abolition bill forward by 
just one vote. And in New Mexico, an abolition bill passed the house 
and then lost in a senate committee by just one vote.
  Other States have taken important steps. Pennsylvania recently 
created a commission to study the administration of the State's death 
penalty, joining many other States that have already done so. 
Moratoriums on executions remain in place in Illinois and New Jersey 
and are under consideration in other States. New York's death penalty 
was overturned by a court decision in 2004 and has not been reinstated 
by the legislature. Along with New York, four other States that still 
have the death penalty technically on their books have not executed any 
individuals since 1976. In addition, there are 12 States, plus the 
District of Columbia, whose laws do not provide for capital punishment 
at all. And in 11 more States, executions have been halted while the 
courts grapple with the issue of whether the lethal injection process 
used by these States is unconstitutional.
  At the same time, the number of executions, the number of death 
sentences imposed, and the size of the death row population have 
decreased for the second year in a row. In the prosecutors' offices, 
jury boxes, and legislative chambers, it seems that consensus is 
growing that it is time for a change.
  In this connection, I think it is significant that the editorial 
boards for two major newspapers in very geographically diverse 
locations, Chicago and Dallas, recently called for an end to the death 
penalty. The Chicago Tribune's editorial page has been a leader for 
years in calling for reforms to the capital punishment system, yet it 
has never called for abolition--until now. Explaining its decision to 
renounce the death penalty, the editorial board stated, ``The system is 
arbitrary, and the system just plain gets it wrong.'' And the Dallas 
Morning News reversed its century-old stance on the death penalty, 
which is particularly notable because Texas has long been a bedrock of 
support for the death penalty and is the State with the dubious 
distinction of leading the Nation in executions. Even in a jurisdiction 
where support for the death penalty runs deep--even there--this strong 
voice of dissent rose to proclaim, ``we do not believe that any legal 
system devised by inherently flawed human beings can determine with 
moral certainty the guilt of every defendant convicted of murder.''
  For these editorial boards, opposition to the death penalty sprang 
from concerns that mistakes might be made and innocent individuals 
executed. Since 1976, when the death penalty was reinstated by the 
Supreme Court, there have been 1,060 executions across the country, 
including three at the Federal level. During that same time period, 123 
people on death row have been exonerated and released from death row. 
These people never should have been convicted in the first place.
  Consider those numbers. One thousand and sixty executions and one 
hundred and twenty-three exonerations in the modern death penalty era. 
Had those exonerations not taken place, had those 123 people been 
executed, those executions would have represented an error rate of 
greater than 10 percent. That is more than an embarrassing statistic; 
it is a horrifying one, one that should have us all questioning the use 
of capital punishment in this country. In fact, since 1999 when I first 
introduced the Federal Death Penalty Abolition Act, 46 death row 
inmates have been exonerated throughout the country.
  The continued use of the death penalty in the United States is 
beneath us. The death penalty is at odds with our best traditions. It 
is wrong and it is immoral. The adage ``two wrongs do not make a 
right'' applies here in the most fundamental way. Our Nation has long 
ago done away with other barbaric punishments like whipping and cutting 
off the ears of criminals. Just as we did away with these punishments 
as contrary to our humanity and ideals, it is time to abolish the death 
penalty. It is not just a matter of morality. The continued viability 
of our criminal justice system as a truly just system that deserves the 
respect of our own people requires that we do so, as does our Nation's 
commitment to freedom, liberty, and equality.
  I applaud those leaders, be they in State government or in the media, 
who are stepping forward to challenge a practice that has no place in 
this day and age. Abolishing the death penalty will not be an easy 
task. It will take patience, persistence, and courage. As each new 
voice joins us, we become stronger, and together we will one day find 
success.

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