The death penalty in the United States gradually dies out?

10-06-2015 12:30

Stacey Anderson regards itself as a conservative Republican. The inhabitant of Nebraska was always a supporter of the death penalty, but ten years ago came the turning point. "That was the death of my friend Heather Guerrero, who was raped and murdered in 2003. The perpetrator got the death penalty. From that moment on I started to delve into it, "she says.

 
Together with other conservatives, Anderson began a campaign against the death penalty in Nebraska. With success: a large majority of the Parliament of Nebraska voted two weeks ago for the abolition of the death penalty.
 
The referendum fight in Nebraska, however, is not over. "It's a moral issue. There are malicious people who commit terrible crimes. For them, the death penalty is an appropriate punishment, "according to Bob Evnen. He is a lawyer in Lincoln, the capital of Nebraska. He collects signatures for a referendum this summer, with which he tries to restore the death penalty in honour. "We deprive the authorities otherwise an important means. I am sure that most inhabitants of Nebraska still for the death penalty. "
 
He understands that this is difficult for outsiders to understand. "This may sound extreme for a country like the Netherlands, where it is much less harsh penalties. But this is something we always in America have done and will continue to do so. "
 
Less death sentences but for how long? The shift among Republicans is part of a much broader trend. More and more American States purchase the death penalty. In 2007, there were only twelve States that have no death penalty knew, now there are nineteen. Three more States have capital punishment for the time being shut down.
 
The other 28 States impose the death penalty on less and less often. That happened in 1995 more than 300 times, in 2014 that number was decreased to 72. That decrease is also reading in public opinion. In 1994 was still 80 percent of Americans for the death penalty, twenty years later was that decreased to 63 percent, according to a poll by Gallup.
 
Also at the Republicans is to see that decline. Many in America responded initially surprised on the outcome in Nebraska. Nebraska gold after all as one of the most conservative u.s. States. But for Stacey Anderson comes as no surprise: "conservatives hate government programs that don't work well. The death penalty is one of them. The abolition of it fits so seamlessly in a conservative agenda. "
 
Example to Ernie Chambers is an important signal. The liberal senator from the Parliament of Nebraska conducted more than forty years campaign against the death penalty. He was all this time a voice crying in the wilderness until he got support from conservative groups.
 
"Nebraska is in many ways so unique that the abolition of the death penalty has a huge impact on the rest of the country. In other States they think now: if they can, then we can also in Nebraska. "
 
By correspondent Arjen van der Horst in Lincoln (Nebraska)/ nos
 

 

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