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The New York Times
OPINION
A Long Time Coming
EDITORIAL,
nytimes.com from the Web, December 15, 2007
It took 31 years, but the moral
bankruptcy, social imbalance, legal impracticality and ultimate futility of the
death penalty has finally penetrated the consciences of lawmakers in one of the
37 states that arrogates to itself the right to execute human beings.
This week, the New Jersey Assembly and Senate passed a law abolishing the death
penalty, and Gov. Jon Corzine, a staunch opponent of execution, promised to sign
the measure very soon. That will make New Jersey the first state to strike
the death penalty from its books since the Supreme Court set guidelines for the
nation’s system of capital punishment three decades ago.
Some lawmakers voted out of principled opposition to the death penalty.
Others felt that having the law on the books without enforcing it (New Jersey
has had a moratorium on executions since 2006) made a mockery of their argument
that it has deterrent value. Whatever the motivation of individual
legislators, by forsaking a barbaric practice that grievously hurts the global
reputation of the United States without advancing public safety, New Jersey has
set a worthy example for the federal government, and for other states that have
yet to abandon the creaky, error-prone machinery of death.
New Jersey’s decision to replace the death penalty with a sentence of life
without parole seems all the wiser coming in the middle of a month that has
already seen the convictions of two people formerly on death row in other states
repudiated. In one case, the defendant was found not guilty following a
new trial.
The momentum to repeal capital punishment has been building in New Jersey since
January, when a 13-member legislative commission recommended its abolition.
The panel, which included two prosecutors, a police chief, members of the clergy
and a man whose daughter was murdered in 2000, cited serious concerns about the
imperfect nature of the justice system and the chance of making an irreversible
mistake. The commission also concluded, quite correctly, that capital
punishment is both a poor deterrent and “inconsistent with evolving standards of
decency.”
By clinging to the death penalty, states keep themselves in the company of
countries like Iran, North Korea and China — a disreputable pantheon of human
mistreatment. Small wonder the gyrations of New Jersey’s Legislature have
been watched intently by human rights activists around the world.
Spurred in large part by the large and growing body of DNA-based exonerations,
there is increasing national unease about the death penalty. The Supreme
Court is poised to consider whether lethal injections that torture prisoners in
the process of killing them amount to unconstitutional cruel and unusual
punishment, an exercise bound to put fresh focus on some of the ugly details of
implementing capital punishment.
In a sense, the practical impact of New Jersey’s action may be largely symbolic.
Although there are eight people on New Jersey’s death row, the moratorium was in
place, and the state has not put anyone to death since 1963. Nevertheless,
it took political courage for lawmakers to join with Governor Corzine.
Their renunciation of the death penalty could prick the conscience of elected
officials in other states and inspire them to muster the courage to revisit
their own laws on capital punishment.
At least that is our fervent hope.
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