Commentary: Death penalty law follows spirit of ’56
John C. Goodwin (left) encourages fellow members of Demarest
(N.J.) United Methodist Church to write letters to state legislators
asking them to repeal the death penalty. A UMNS photo courtesy of John
C. Goodwin.
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A UMNS Commentary
By John C. Goodwin*
March 28, 2008
"You have women clergy in The United Methodist Church?" The question
was posed to me several years ago by Sister Dorothy Briggs, a new friend
in the movement to abolish the death penalty.
Acknowledging that she knew very little about the Protestant church, she
was delighted to learn that most Protestant churches ordain women. She
was especially pleased to learn that The United Methodist Church has
female bishops.
John C. Goodwin
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I went on to tell her about the spirit of '56.
In 1956, the Methodist Church gave women full clergy rights. The 1956
General Conference also added opposition to the death penalty to the
church's Book of Discipline. There had been church editorials
against capital punishment going back at least to the trial and
executions of Nicola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti in the 1920s, but it
wasn’t until 1956 that opposition to the death penalty became church
policy.
Movement in New Jersey
On Dec. 17, 2007, New Jersey Gov. Jon Corzine signed a bill
abolishing the death penalty, making New Jersey the first state to
abolish the practice since capital punishment was reinstated in 1976
after a U.S. Supreme Court-ordered hiatus. According to the Death
Penalty Information Center, 36 states now allow capital punishment,
while 14 others, plus the District of Columbia, do not.
Why New Jersey? Corzine had stated that he has been against capital
punishment for his entire political life. But governors can’t change
state laws without the support of a majority of the state’s legislators.
Legislators need to know the views of their constituents. An important
role for the church is to educate people on moral issues and to
encourage them to express their views, and the position of the church,
to their legislators.
Many church members are unaware that The United Methodist Church opposes
capital punishment, and certainly there are United Methodists on both
sides of this issue.
In 1998, the New Jersey Council of Churches called together 10
Protestant leaders to discuss the death penalty and possible responses.
Out of that meeting came a pastoral letter in which the denominational
leaders explained that in their view the death penalty was incompatible
with Christian teachings, and they pledged to educate their members.
“An important role for the church is to
educate people on moral issues and to encourage them to express their
views, and the position of the church, to their legislators.”
Former United Methodist Bishop Alfred Johnson, a signer of the
pastoral letter, established the New Jersey area Task Force to Abolish
the Death Penalty. I became the co-convener of the task force, working
first with the Rev. Bryan Bass-Riley and then with the Rev. William
Greene. Coordinating closely with the conference board of church and
society, we developed educational and worship materials, sponsored a
public event with guest speakers, led workshops in churches and wrote
resolutions which, after passage at each annual conference, were mailed
by the conference secretary to all 120 state legislators and the
governor.
The task force also aligned itself with a newly formed secular
organization––New Jerseyans for a Death Penalty Moratorium––which later
became New Jerseyans for
Alternatives to the Death Penalty. I joined their executive committee as
did the Rev. Karl Kraft, a United Methodist pastor, and our bishops
have served on the advisory committee.
Laying the groundwork
Without this organization—and the faith and secular groups they
enlisted in the cause of abolition—New Jersey would not have made death
penalty history.
They visited legislators, organized public meetings and letter-writing
campaigns, often in churches, and developed a database of more than
10,000 sympathetic individuals. They brought in innocent exonerated
Death Row inmates to speak and to testify before governmental
committees. Several surviving family members of violent crimes actively
proved that survivors don’t always demand executions to bring about
"closure."
Sister Briggs, who died in 2006 at the age of 83, organized a program
that encourages people to ring their church bells or put up banners on
those days when someone, anywhere in the country, is executed. My church
displays such a banner, which is often seen by our pro-death penalty
state senator.
I am convinced that the United States will join Western Europe and most
of the democracies of the world in giving up the death penalty. But
here, for a time at least,
the work must be done on a state-by-state basis. This is how The United Methodist Church can help to make a difference.
*Goodwin, a photojournalist, is a member of the United Methodist Church at Demarest, N.J.
News media contact: Linda Bloom, New York, (646) 369-3759 or newsdesk@umcom.org.
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Resources
The United Methodist Church on the Death Penalty
United Methodist Board of Church and Society
New Jerseyans for Alternatives to the Death Penalty
Death Penalty Information Center
Tolling the Bells
Greater New Jersey Annual Conference |