Nebraska shocked the nation earlier this week when it became the first “Red State” in over a decade to repeal the death penalty. Lawmakers in that state voted 30-19 to override a veto by Governor Pete Ricketts (R-NE). The Cornhusker state now accompanies 18 other states and ?Washington D.C., in banning executions.
This Nebraska death penalty repeal is a very significant one. The state of Nebraska has not executed anyone since 1997. Presently, they have ten inmates sitting on death row. Surely, those souls are leaping for joy. What is significant about this event is that Nebraska is a dark “Red State” with a Republican governor and a majority Republican legislature. Over the last several years, support for the death penalty has decreased in America.
This death penalty repeal is an encouraging sign for various reasons. For starters, the American public has become disenchanted with the legal process that determines who lives and who dies. As proof of this shift, 18 states have banned the death penalty. In the case of Nebraska, a substantially Republican state, it makes it an even more eye-opening occurrence.
What makes even more sense about this ban and the growing discomfort surrounding the death penalty is the increasing list of inmates who have been freed from death row based on new evidence, DNA testing, and other scientific forensic applications.?Without question, America has exterminated more than one innocent soul. To the heart of the issue, as long as we have a legal system that provides very little proper defense for indigent defendants coupled by overzealous and ambitious prosecutors?serving various motivations, we will continue to see the real death panels in this nation our Judicial system.
Video coverage of this development:
