This week, the seventh state since 2007 voted to repeal the death penalty. And this time, it was one of the most conservative states in the U.S. — Nebraska.
This is just one more sign that the death penalty is on borrowed time, nationally and in North Carolina. Nineteen states have now abolished it, several more have active repeal campaigns, and the vast majority of U.S. states, including North Carolina, are no longer carrying out executions.
Conservatives here hailed the Nebraska legislature, which on Wednesday overrode a veto from the state’s governor.
“Conservatives in North Carolina are coming to the same conclusions that Republican lawmakers in Nebraska reached,” said Ballard Everett, state coordinator for N.C. Conservatives Concerned About the Death Penalty. “The death penalty is a costly, inefficient government program. We know government makes mistakes, and when it comes to granting the state the power to kill its citizens, the risk is too high.”
Nebraska is the first conservative state to abolish the death penalty since North Dakota in 1973, but it will not be the last. Last week, even national conservative columnist George Will said the death penalty is dying, and rightly so. It is now common wisdom that the death penalty is costly, inefficient, and hopelessly error-prone.
In North Carolina, legislators and statewide office holders still seem to think that pushing for executions will earn them votes. Let’s hope they will soon get the message: We no longer need a punishment that threatens the innocent, costs millions, and takes decades to carry out.
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