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Show ___ TheSalt Lake Tribune OPINION Friday, June 13, 1997 McVeigh Case Is Good Example To Use Against Death Penalty Some Efforts Nation Could Use For Avoiding Racial Conflict tence for being so helpful to the law — and Perp Two, who was nevereven inside the house, bought the death penalty. He's gone. Does that compare to what McVeigh did? MOLLYIVINS A23 best timeto talk about it CLARENCE PAGE what I call “agenda shock.” They are reluetant to recognize the victories the movement has won becausethey are un- Give you another example —a horrible crime, A retarded, mentally disturbed guy whowasliving across the street from certain of the fundamentally economic agenda that must comenext a conventin Amarillo raped and killed an Yet, polls show grass-roots black folks are calling for action on jobs, schools, elderly nun, Can't hardly get worse than AUSTIN — The case of Timothy MeVeigh is a fey good argument against the death penalty as currently practiced, Please hear meout on this becauseit's a sound argument, In mystate of Texas, the death penalty is now an assembly-line process: You convict ‘em, we fry 'em, And thanks to some recent Supreme Courtdecisions, as Texas goes, 80 goes the nation. Weare dead-beddin’ folks down here 80 fast and so often, you can't get people to raise an eyebrow over it, no matter whatthe specifics of a case are, We've already executed 20 people this year — eight in the last two weeks, six more scheduled this month, I rememberthefirst time we executed a man we knew was innocent — couldn't get anyone excited about that, either, ‘This luckless slob was caught in a remnant of English commonlaw, Two perp set out to commit a felony — ‘to wit, burglary. First perp holds open a window sereen; second perp crawls inside, encounters homeowner, panics and shoots innocentcitizen. Perp Twois still standing outside the window, guilty of burglarious intent and aggravated screen opening, But under the law, Perp Twois just as guilty as Perp One because they conspired to commit a felony. Perp One rolled over on Perp Twoto save his own skin — he settled for a little prison sen- that. Butthis sorry citizen barely had the IQ of a Labrador retriever. Did he realize what he had done? We're not even sure he knew his own name. Tt was so pathetic that the fellow nuns housing, crime and economic develop- of the murder victim — her only family — asked that the man not be put to death. The popeaskedthat this perp not be put to death. But we put him to death anyway Does that compare to what McVeigh did? Weareespecially apt to fry ‘em if a black perp offs a white victim — andif you evenblink at that, you're too ignorant to be in this discussion, But most ofall, Timothy McVeigh rently practicedis its random, haphazard nature. ‘The other big myth wehearall the time is that folks on death row haveyears to appeal — that they make these endless appeals that drag through the courts that above all other reasons, we fry ‘em because they had bad lawyers. take forever. That may have been truein order to draw the death penalty, you have Now, if you have been given the death penalty, new federal and state laws make The common misimpression is that in to be guilty as sin of a truly heinous crime, Wrong. You don't have to be accused of a particularly horrible crime to draw the death penalty; you don't even haveto be guilty. Since the Supreme Court reinstated the death penalty in 1976, 63 death-row in- mates have beensetfree after it was conclusively proved that they werenot guilty of the crimes for which they had been sentenced to die, Those guys had some bad lawyers, No one doubts that the overwhelming majority of those on death row are guilty as charged, But don’t ever think they're there as a result of some near-infallible process, with so many safeguardsandlegal fail-safes that no innocent person could ever be wrongly convicted. Theeeriest thing about the death penalty as cur- 3, Write and embrace a post-civil rights agenda Manycivil rights leaders are locked in years past, but that is badly dated information. it almost impossible for an appeal to be heard by federal judges. So, no one has any timeto find out how manyother innocent people might be on death row, Weare long past the silly notion that the death penalty deters anyone(that theory has been blown to pieces so many times it hardly seems worth citing the studies), so we are left with the reality that we impose the death penalty as the ultimate punishment, Whatis “ultimate” aboutit in these circumstances? If we want to express our outrage at a Tim MeVeigh, shouldn't we be less promiscuousin our use of the death penalty? When weuseit all the time, on every Tom, Dick and Harry with a dumb, lazy lawyer,it just doesn’t seem like muchof a way to punish someonelike McVeigh. Prospects Dim for Campaign-Spending Reform CHICAGO TRIBUNE SERVICE ment. Those are the kinds of issues around which concerned blacks and whites can build a new consensus and WASHINGTON — can't wait to hear movement at least as large as that led by Martin Luther King Jr. how President Clinton plans to patch up differences between the races, He has a hard enough timetrying to patch up his owndifferences with Congress. Clinton is expected to offer a blueprint for racial reconciliation when hedelivers the commencementaddress at the University of California at San Diego this Saturday, Heis looking for a legacy and quite properly thinks he can makea valuable contribution in the area of race, America's perennial problem. He mayberight, Race is an area in which he has stood out as particularly adept at bridging gaps. Unlike many white politicians, he has taken thetimeto get to know someblack people. He probably has spent moretime in black churches, for example, even when he is not running for election, than any other president in history, He looks genuinely comfortable and, when the choir sings, claps on the beat More important, when he mounts the podium, he preaches the same unwaver- ing line to white and black congregations alike — anti-crime, pro-family, anti-dependency, pro-self-help, The enthusiastic responses he receives demonstrate that, despite the divisive rhetoric of many other politicians, blacks and whites still share a lot more values in common than we hold separately. Still, Clinton has him. Aides say his force on hate crimes, munities of racial his work cut out for plans include a task visits to model comharmonyandhigh-visi- 4. Restoretrust. Too many blacks don't trust whites to be fair. Too many whites don't trust blacks to work hard, Peopleare reluctant to work hard if they don't think they're goingto get their fair reward, People are reluctant to be fair to people they don't trust, Jesse Jackson, the Congressional Black Caucus and othercivil rights leaders have called for more moneyto be spentoncivil rights enforcement. Budget-conscious Clinton is reluctant to spend money on anything. That's a mistake. Thefederal Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, created by the 1964 Civil Rights Act, has never been fully funded. Today its backlog of cases is years long. If the president andotherpoliticians of bothparties aresincere in their desire to improve racial equality without resorting to quotas, they should stand up in a united consensus behind a strengthened civil rights enforcement 5, Be "divinely dissatisfied.”” ‘That was Martin Luther King’s advice in one ofhis last speeches before he was sinated. Hecalled onall of us to be ivinelydissatisfied until that day when thereis no ‘white power,’ when thereis no ‘black power,’ but there is only God's power and human power.” ‘That'sstill pretty good advice today. bility summits and town hall meetings on diversity. Richard J, Durbin, D-Ill Actually, the target never was realistic WALTER R. MEARS THE ASSOCIATED PRESS WASHINGTON — So much for the myth that voter outrage over excesses of the last campaign was going to propel ac- tion to reform away fund-raising abuses and swollen spending before the next one. It isn't happening, and eveniftelevised congressional hearings this summerstir the political moneyissue, they don’t seem likely to mobilize the kind of pressure re- formers expected early this year. Thepublic demand that PresidentClinton said should lead to enactmentof a reform law by July 4 wasn’t there. “T think he understood that unless we could bring thatlegislation quickly to his desk, the likelihoodof influencing the '98 cycle was very, very remote,” said Sen. against Republican resistance. Nowit is no more than a Democratic talking point, and even the staged speeches concedethe outcome, So do Americans surveyed in a poll commissioned by reform advocates. While 60 percentsaid it should be on the prioritylist, only 15 percent wantedit at the top. And 57 percentsaid they had little or no confidence that Congress and Clinton would produce lawsreducing the role of moneyin politics, ‘That survey for the Center for Responsive Politics reflects the mood in other polls — interest but not urgency about reform; concern, when asked, about the influence of money and big donors; and a judgment that Democrats and Republi- cans are equally likely to be involved in questionable fund-raising. No groundswell, and no significant pressure from beyond the Beltway. The Senate bill Clinton supports includes incentives to limit spending by congressional candidates, an end to the unlimited contributions that now can be delivered to political parties — the kind of money involved in the Democrats’ improper 1996 fund-raising — and restrictions on donations by political action committees. It is styled as a bipartisan bill. There are 30 sponsors, all but three of them Democrats. The Republicanswhocontrol Congress won't acceptthatbill and aren't muchinterested in others. A Senate GOP task force was going to consider and suggest alternatives, but hasn't. “There is no will, there is no commitment to real campaign reform from the Today's problemsof race are wrapped upin complicating problems of class, eth- nicity, economic opportunity and dual perceptions, especially of the criminal justice system. With that in mind, I offer several suggestionsfor the presidentand therest of us 1, Admit that we have a problem. Racismis a social disease, like alcoholism. Like the recovering alcoholic, we mustfirst admit that we have a problem. 2. Reintroduceourselves to each other. The great divide that opened up over the Los Angelesriots and the 0.J. Simpson verdicts, among other recent racial eruptions, are the results of our failure as Americansto continue our national conversation on race that broke downin the Republican side,’ Democrat Durbinsaid. “Unfortunately, that means that the dis- appear “color-blind” or avoid offense, mal swamp of American politics will con- many treat race as a taboo topicin racial- tinue to exist.” 1960s. Today, in a misguided attempt to President Clinton ly mixed company, which actually is the Give Dad a powertool that'll save him upto $100. AT&T Digital PCS with a $100 local airtime credit. Get Dad AT&TDigital PCS and he'll get a $100 airtime credit. And,since it's AT&T Digital PCS, he'll get even more. Like standby time that's 2 to 3 times greaterthan cellular: Fewer droppedcalls. Paging Messaging. Voicemail. And Caller ID. Not to mention access to the nation’slargest digital wireless network, with no annual contract, It's a gift that'll give Dad something to talk about for years to come. 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