Alabama is one of six states throughout the nation considering a legally authorized period of delay on the death penalty, and many religious leaders and organizations have recently taken stands.
Protestant, Jewish and Catholic leaders urged Congress and the White House on March 9 to suspend federal executions while capital punishment is examined for disproportionately targeting minorities and poor people.
Following the lead of Illinois Gov. George Ryan, who imposed a moratorium on executions while investigators try to find out why more death sentences have been overturned than carried out, religious leaders said Congress must halt executions so that no innocent inmates are put to death.
A dozen religious leaders gathered at the U.S. Capitol with Sen. Russ Feingold, D-Wis., who has introduced a bill to abolish the federal death penalty. Feingold’s bill is currently working its way through a Senate committee, but so far Feingold has managed to find only one other senator to support the bill.
More than 30 religious leaders from a broad spectrum of faiths signed a letter to President Clinton urging a federal moratorium. Clinton has previously refused to issue such a ban.
Phil Wogaman, pastor of Washington D.C.’s Foundry United Methodist Church — the church regularly attended by President and Mrs. Clinton — said the death penalty should only be used if it can be assured it is being administered justly.
“There is no room here for mistakes,” Wogaman said. “No innocent person should ever be executed.”
Speaking for the National Conference of Catholic Bishops, Ricardo Ramirez, the bishop of Las Cruces, N.M., echoed statements by Pope John Paul II that society can never make up for a victim’s life by taking the life of the killer.
“We oppose capital punishment primarily because of what it does to us as a society,” Ramirez said. “It perpetuates a terrible cycle of violence and the notion that we can settle our most intractable problems by resorting to violence.”
Religious broadcaster Pat Robertson has added his support to a nationwide moratorium on capital punishment. (Compiled from wire services)
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