Floyd: Death penalty costs Kentucky plenty while accomplishing very little

By DAVID FLOYD
50th State Representative

Wednesday, March 5, 2014 – HB 330 is my bill to repeal the death penalty. Truthfully, I don’t believe that many people have thought deeply about capital punishment, and, I admit, I had insufficiently pondered it as well.

My initial opposition formed about 15 years through a spiritual lens, and I have always cosponsored legislation for its repeal. But I was the only conservative legislator in a group of liberals. Over these last few years, “liberal” and spiritual arguments have failed to persuade other legislators to take up these bills. This year, the Catholic Conference approached me to lead the effort instead of simply being a cosponsor. How might we bring other conservatives with us, and at last vote to abolish our death penalty? This might be done by exploring together conservative arguments in favor of repeal.

Conservatives value innocent life and should not support a state government program that can kill innocent people. In a government program run by human beings mistakes can be made; with the death penalty, innocent people can and have been executed. Kentucky has sentenced 78 individuals to death since 1976. Fifty of those convictions have been overturned, and one inmate was released from a sentence of death because he was wrongly convicted. There is no right way to do the wrong thing; every person should agree that it’s not worth sacrificing the innocent to kill the guilty.

Conservatives are mindful of the potential to abuse power that has been granted by the people, and should not trust the government with the power to execute a person who is safely behind bars. In Kentucky judges and prosecutors hold elective political office, but surely the decision to execute someone should not be a political decision.

Our history suffers no shortage of elected leaders who have abused their power. Giving them authority to kill should be worrisome.

Conservatives are the first to call out government programs that fail to meet intended goals and cost exorbitant amounts of money. (We certainly don’t trust the government to run our nation’s health care system, for example.)

Death penalty cases require decades of court activity, since our precautions require this lengthy and costly process; it cannot be shortened. This puts families of murder victims and families of the condemned through years of additional trauma with the accompanying media attention and uncertainty.
Conservatives want a government that will balance budgets, cut waste, and eliminate programs that do not make fiscal sense.

Kentucky’s death penalty is a program that costs a lot while accomplishing little. We’ve spent well over $100 million on the death penalty since 1976 – and executed 3 people. Having a death penalty is clearly wasting taxpayer dollars, while a penalty of life without the possibility of parole makes much better economic sense.

Lady Justice is usually depicted wearing a blindfold, signifying objectivity. There should be no favor in meting out justice, no regard for power or weakness, nor money, or position. The truth is our death penalty doesn’t meet this standard. Most Kentucky counties don’t use it. Two identical murders in bordering counties can receive two completely different sentences. To make matters worse, people of color and those in poverty are disproportionately sentenced to death rather than to life in prison. Something is terribly wrong.
Capital punishment in Kentucky is a broken government program that risks killing the wrongly convicted, risks abuse of power, wastes resources, is arbitrary and unjust.

We’ve tried to make the death penalty work, but we have been unable to fix its many problems and reconcile it with our conservative principles. We should repeal the death penalty and replace it with Life Without Parole. It’s the only – only – way to ensure that no innocent people are killed by the Commonwealth of Kentucky, and that those impacted by the process get finality much sooner.

Conservatives must work with people across the political spectrum to expose the many deficiencies of Kentucky’s system of capital punishment. And then we must repeal.

Saturday we will be in New Hope at the Food Mart for Coffee with Dave. Sen. Jimmy Higdon is expected to join us, and we hope to see you there.

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