U.S. Senator Rick Santorum, an out­spo­ken con­ser­v­a­tive Catholic from Pennsylvania, is re-exam­in­ing his views on cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment. In response to the announce­ment by the U.S. Catholic Conference of Bishops con­cern­ing their new Campaign to End the Use of the Death Penalty, Santorum said, ​“I felt very trou­bled about cas­es where some­one may have been con­vict­ed wrong­ly. DNA evi­dence def­i­nite­ly should be used when pos­si­ble. I agree with the pope that in the civ­i­lized world … the appli­ca­tion of the death penal­ty should be lim­it­ed. I would def­i­nite­ly agree with that. I would cer­tain­ly sug­gest there prob­a­bly should be some fur­ther lim­its on what we use it for.” This is a sig­nif­i­cant shift in opin­ion on the death penal­ty for Santorum, who vot­ed against replac­ing cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment with life with­out parole in 1994 and helped to block a 1996 effort to make it eas­i­er for those on death row to appeal their con­vic­tions. He said, ​“I nev­er thought about it that much when I was real­ly a sup­port­er of the death penal­ty. I still see it as poten­tial­ly valu­able, but I would be one to urge more cau­tion than I would have in the past.” Santorum’s remarks came as the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops released a Zogby International poll show­ing a dra­mat­ic decline in Catholic sup­port for capital punishment.

(Pittsburgh Post Gazette, March 22, 2005) (empha­sis added). See New Voices and Innocence.

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