This Week
Uphill
All The Way
Wisconsin's Feingold seeks a
national death penalty
moratorium.
JAMES D. BESSER
Washington Correspondent
Jewish senator is leading the
push for a nationwide mora-
torium on executions until
studies about how capital
punishment is applied are completed.
And he is getting strong backing from
some Jewish groups.
Last week, Sen. Russ Feingold (D-
Wis.) introduced the National Death
Penalty Moratorium Act of 2000,
which would temporarily halt all exe-
cutions until a national commission
completes a review of safeguards in the
capital punishment system.
The new legislation was introduced
several months after Illinois Gov. George
Ryan, a Republican, imposed an execu-
tion moratorium after several death-row
inmates were proven innocent.
In that state, more death sentences
have been overturned than carried out
— a statistic that has alarmed even
pro-capital punishment politicians like
Ryan.
The Religious Action Center of
Reform Judaism has been lining up
religious groups behind the moratori-
um movement, and pressing other
state governors to_follow Ryan's exam-
ple.
So far, none of the governors has
responded to the RAC appeal.
Mark Pelavin, the RAC's associate
director, conceded that the Feingold
measure and a House version, spon-
sored by Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr. (D-Ill.),
face tough going in a session that is
unlikely to get beyond the essentials.
But, he said, "public opinion on
the death penalty is shifting. Support
for the death penalty is high, but it's
at the lowest level in a generation.
And the cumulative weight of new
evidence is casting a lot of doubt
among people." The idea of putting
off new executions until the entire
capital punishment system is studied
"really picks up on peoples' concern
that if we apply the death penalty, we
should be sure," Pelavin said
Feingold said the error rate in capi-
tal convictions is "scandalously large,"
noting that courts have freed 85
death-row inmates since 1973. El
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