NEW VOICES: Texas Democrats Endorse Moratorium on Executions, End to Juvenile Death Penalty

The Texas Democratic Party has adopted an historic party platform that contains a number of death penalty reform recommendations, including a call for legislators to enact a moratorium on executions, to ban the execution of juvenile offenders and the mentally ill, and to consider adopting a life without paroles sentence in Texas. More than 1,700 attendees at the Democratic Party’s state convention signed a resolution calling for the moratorium, surpassing the 30% signature threshold required to bring a measure before the full voting body. That voting block overwhelmingly supported the recommendations and added the measures to the final party platform. (2004 Texas Democratic Party Playform, June 19, 2004) Read the Texas Democratic Party Platform.