[When I published this article, I was trying to run as a write-in candidate for the North Carolina Senate. I have since dropped my campaign, but what I said remains true , and perhaps some other candidate will take up where I left off.]

I oppose the death penalty more vigorously than the incumbents in state Senate District 13.

One of the incumbent Senators from District 13, Jeanne Lucas, was a co-sponsor of Senate Bill 172, the so-called moratorium bill, in 2001. The bill would postpone all executions until a study commission could report on the death penalty. I oppose a legislative moratorium for the following reasons:

(a) Common sense, plus a consensus of civilized opinion, says that keeping people on Death Row for an unspecified period of time, while deciding what to do with them, is a form of torture, plain and simple. The *Soering* case and the *Pratt and Morgan* case show how indefinite detention on Death Row conflicts with human rights standards in civilized communities. The history of the moratorium in Jamaica shows that it is possible that a moratorium can be imposed, and later lifted, subjecting death-row inmates to what appears to be a cruel game of cat and mouse.

The inhumane nature of prolonged incarceration on Death Row was discussed by the Judicial Committee of the (British) Privy Council in the *Pratt and Morgan* case:

"In 1947 there was great public disquiet that men convicted of a murder on the Gold Coast [now Ghana] had been under sentence of death for two years. The matter was debated in Parliament and the Colonial Secretary gave an assurance to the House that the rules and practice to be adopted in the Colonies should be quite sufficient to prevent a repetition of the happenings in the Gold Coast. The concern expressed by members of Parliament in the course of the debate reflected the expectation that the Colonies would follow the long established practice in this country that execution would not be long delayed after sentence. Mr. Winston Churchill expressed the sentiment of the House when he said 'people ought not to be brought up to execution, or believe that they are to be executed, time after time whether innocent or guilty, however it may be, whatever their crime. That is a wrong thing'."

(see the *Pratt and Morgan* decision online at

http://www.privy-council.org.uk/judicial-committee/key-judgments/judgment0008.htm).

Senate Bill 172 proposes to treat death-row inmates so cruelly that even Winston Churchill, not noted for his humanitarianism or his sympathy for non-whites, said that subjecting convicted African murderers to such cruelty was "a wrong thing."

Opponents of the death penalty should be at least as sensitive to human rights as Winston Churchill.

Instead of following the route laid down in Senate Bill 172, the state of North Carolina should undertake a study of the death penalty, and in view of the doubts over the death penalty, all death-row inmates should have their sentences commuted to life. If a study commission ultimately proposes to "mend not end" the death penalty, those who were sentenced to death before the appointment of the study commission should have their lives spared, since the very fact of the appointment of a study commission implies that there are bugs in the system.

(b) Senate Bill 172 contradicts Article III(5)(6) of the North Carolina Constitution, which provides: "The Governor may grant reprieves, commutations, and pardons, after conviction, for all offenses (except in cases of impeachment), upon such conditions as he may think proper, subject to regulations prescribed by law relative to the manner of applying for pardons. The terms reprieves, commutations, and pardons shall not include paroles." SB 172 represents an instance of the General Assembly encroaching on the Governor's constitutional power to "grant reprieves," notwithstanding the fact that the legislature is not permitted to usurp executive functions. Article I(6) of the state Constitution says: "The legislative, executive, and supreme judicial powers of the State government shall be [forever] separate and distinct from each other." Prescribing the permissible range of punishments for a given crime is a legislative function, but giving reprieves to people on death row is an executive function. The only way the legislature can constitutionally establish a moratorium on executions is by abolishing the death penalty.

(c) SB 172 is also wrong because it provides that, after conducting a study of the death penalty, the General Assembly will take action "addressing the fair and impartial administration of the death penalty in accordance with due process, and limiting, to the degree practicable, the risk that innocent persons may be executed." However, the death death penalty *cannot* be administered fairly and impartially. If such a thing were possible, it would have been achieved sometime within the past 2,000 years, but a fair and impartial death penalty still hasn't been reached. Studying ways to make the death penalty fair and impartial would be as fruitless as seeking the secret of perpetual motion. In addition, abolitionists should seek to *eliminate* the risk of executive innocent people, whereas SB 172 speaks only of *limiting* that risk *to the degree practicable.* If this were 1960, would Senator Lucas speak in terms of "limiting Jim Crow to the degree practicable?"

The Libertarian candidates for District 13 will probably say they oppose the death penalty. They'll be telling the truth if the death penalty means judicial executions. But libertarians are willing to support other forms of death sentences in the name of "defensive war." Death by bombing, death by shooting, death by burying alive-these are all penalties implicitly endorsed by the Libertarian Party for the crime of being a member of the enemy armed forces or being in the vicinity of said armed forces. No trial or conviction is required.

This puts the Libertarians in the position of opposing a death sentence imposed on a person convicted of a grisly murder after a trial, but supporting a death sentence for an Afghan soldier or civilian who has not been convicted of anything. Wait-the Libertarians want to keep casualties to a minimum. OK, I suppose that's fine. Unless you're one of the casualties. But I don't hear *them* complaining.

The Libertarian platform and public position, regardless of individual dissenters in the Party, is de facto pro-death-penalty because it's a pro-war platform. Yes, they would limit the scope of war, but they would allow for war in some contingencies. I wouldn't.

Some people would want the state of North Carolina to extradite people for capital crimes if they're wanted in other states. Let the U. S. Supreme Court order the arrest of such people-I would not even encourage the death penalty indirectly by extradition. The principles of the *Prinz* decision indicate that the states don't have to carry out federal policies. Let the feds extradite capital defendants from state to state. Let George do it.

I look forward to the time when the needle will land on history's landfill, next to the rack, the stake, New Coke, and Vanilla Ice's career.