In a First, Democrats' Platform to Call for Death Penalty Abolition
The words of Bill and Hillary Clinton during their respective presidential campaigns — 24 years apart — illustrate the decline in both the support and use of the death penalty in America — a shift expected to result in the Democrats becoming the first major U.S. political party to formally call for the abolition of capital punishment later this month.
More than two decades later, Hillary Clinton has expressed ambivalence on the campaign trail when asked about capital punishment. "States have proven themselves incapable of carrying out fair trials" in death penalty cases, she said in March during a campaign appearance in Ohio, while leaving open the possibility of capital punishment under federal law, in a case investigated and prosecuted by the U.S. Department of Justice.
But her campaign has agreed to a provision in the Democratic Party platform, which is expected to be adopted at the party's national convention in Philadelphia beginning July 25, that says, "We will abolish the death penalty, which has proven to be a cruel and unusual form of punishment. It has no place in the United States of America."
The landmark language is the latest illustration of a slow but major shift in American politics.
In calling for the abolition of the death penalty in the platform, Democrats are out in front of both public opinion and the leaders of their party.
Both Gallup and Pew polls last year showed a majority of Americans (56 percent in the Pew survey, 61 percent in Gallup's) still support death sentences, although that is a marked decline from 1994, when 80 percent of Americans told Gallup they supported capital punishment.
And neither President Barack Obama nor Hillary Clinton have formally called for an end of the death penalty, though both have been critical about how it has been administered. Those positions are in some ways similar to the caution they exhibited before embracing same-sex marriage.
The inclusion of the death penalty plank in the platform was a victory for allies of Bernie Sanders, who opposes death sentences. (In a statement, Maya Harris, a top Clinton aide who is heavily involved in the platform process, called the overall platform "the most ambitious and progressive" every adopted by Democrats. Her list of achievements, which included measures like calling for a $15 minimum wage, did not refer to the death penalty provision.)
Obama, in an one-on-one interview on criminal justices issues with Keller last year, said he did not oppose the death penalty "in theory," but said he had "very significant reservations" about its use in the United States, arguing it was "inefficient" and suffered from "racial bias."
Despite the push by Democrats to abolish the death penalty, key Republicans still largely favor capital punishment. The GOP's 2012 platform stated that "courts should have the option of imposing the death penalty in capital murder cases." It is not expected that language will be dramatically changed at the party's convention in Cleveland later this month.
In December, Donald Trump said that if he were elected president, he would issue an executive order urging the death penalty any time a police officer is killed.
http://www.nbcnews.com/meet-the-pres...lition-n605946
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