Steve Monks, a for­mer Durham County, North Carolina, GOP Chair, recent­ly called for an end to the death penal­ty in the state. 

Earlier in June, leg­is­la­tors vot­ed to repeal the Racial Justice Act, which had allowed death row inmates to chal­lenge their sen­tences using sta­tis­ti­cal evi­dence of racial bias. Monks wrote in an op-ed in Plain Talk Politics that the most recent attempts to reform cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment in the state are strong indi­ca­tions that the sys­tem will nev­er work properly.” 

Monk encour­aged con­ser­v­a­tive Republicans to reex­am­ine the death penal­ty in light of the system’s addi­tion­al costs com­pared to life with­out parole, the risks of wrong­ful exe­cu­tions, and its fail­ure to bring clo­sure to mur­der vic­tims’ fam­i­lies. Monk con­clud­ed, The time has come for con­ser­v­a­tives here in North Carolina to ask our­selves if the death penal­ty real­ly fits with our val­ues. We all want a small­er, more effi­cient gov­ern­ment that does not abuse its pow­er, along with swift and sure jus­tice… Let’s put an end to North Carolina’s seem­ing­ly end­less death penal­ty debate by sim­ply bring­ing our pol­i­tics in line with our con­ser­v­a­tive prin­ci­ples – waste­ful gov­ern­ment pro­grams that don’t work and go against our val­ues should be end­ed.” Read full op-ed below.

Guest Opinion: Steve Monks, Conservatives Concerned about the Death Penalty

As leg­is­la­tors in Raleigh once again fid­dle with our state’s death penal­ty, some of us who are con­ser­v­a­tive repub­li­cans are at the point where we’ve had enough. The most recent attempts to mod­i­fy North Carolina’s death penal­ty, yet again, are the lat­est indi­ca­tions that the sys­tem will nev­er work prop­er­ly. Conservatives across the nation are wak­ing up to this the fact. I know about it first­hand because my broth­er, who lives in Houston, Texas, is a found­ing mem­ber of a group called Conservatives Concerned About the Death Penalty.

My brother’s group is part of a grow­ing num­ber of peo­ple on the right” who are open­ly ques­tion­ing whether the death penal­ty serves any good pur­pose for our soci­ety. Conservatives are ask­ing these ques­tions pre­cise­ly because we are conservative republicans.

The group exhib­it­ed at the recent Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) in Washington and the reac­tion made it clear the stereo­type about con­ser­v­a­tives all sup­port­ing cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment is com­plete­ly invalid. Their booth in the exhib­it hall at CPAC was busy through­out the 3‑day con­fer­ence and the state­ment they kept hear­ing from peo­ple was, I am so glad to see you here, I thought I was the only one…”

Conservative Republicans have every rea­son to reex­am­ine cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment. The death penal­ty system’s addi­tion­al costs com­pared to life with­out the pos­si­bil­i­ty of release are beyond dis­pute. The tri­als, with so much at stake, are nec­es­sar­i­ly expen­sive and the appeals can take decades because of the real con­cern of exe­cut­ing inno­cent peo­ple. Attempts to fix” the sys­tem to make it faster have repeat­ed­ly failed pre­cise­ly because of the inno­cence issue; more than 140 death row inmates have been released after evi­dence came to light that they were wrongfully convicted.

For the fam­i­lies of mur­der vic­tims a death sen­tence almost always rep­re­sents a false promise – 3,000 inmates on death rows and 43 were exe­cut­ed last year – while the mur­der vic­tims’ fam­i­lies are sen­tenced to nav­i­gate the sys­tem for decades with no end in sight.

Along with the exces­sive costs to tax­pay­ers, the risk of killing inno­cent peo­ple, and the impact on vic­tims’ fam­i­lies, many con­ser­v­a­tives can offer anoth­er com­pelling rea­son; our pro-life beliefs. We are increas­ing­ly re-think­ing the death penal­ty because of its many prob­lems, but also because of our respect for human life.

The time has come for con­ser­v­a­tives here in North Carolina to ask our­selves if the death penal­ty real­ly fits with our val­ues. We all want a small­er, more effi­cient gov­ern­ment that does not abuse its pow­er, along with swift and sure jus­tice. After all, isn’t this part of what con­ser­v­a­tives stand for? Well, our sys­tem of cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment is any­thing but swift, small, effi­cient and sure.

Let’s put an end to North Carolina’s seem­ing­ly end­less death penal­ty debate by sim­ply bring­ing our pol­i­tics in line with our con­ser­v­a­tive prin­ci­ples – waste­ful gov­ern­ment pro­grams that don’t work and go against our val­ues should be ended.

(S. Monks, Guest Opinion: Steve Monks, Conservatives Concerned about the Death Penalty,” Plain Talk Politics, June 17, 2013). See New Voices and Recent Legislation.

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