On August 1, The Movement for Black Lives issued a 40-point pol­i­cy plat­form that includes a call for the abo­li­tion of cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment. The plat­form, which was writ­ten or endorsed by more than 60 activist groups includ­ing the Black Lives Matter Network, describes its pur­pose as ​“articulat[ing] our vision of a fun­da­men­tal­ly dif­fer­ent world.” The por­tion of the plat­form seek­ing ​“an end to cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment” calls the death penal­ty ​“moral­ly repug­nant,” and links it to the lega­cy of race-based lynch­ings against Blacks in the U.S. ​“The death penal­ty deval­ues Black lives,” it states, going on to describe cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment as ​“geo­graph­i­cal­ly dis­crim­i­na­to­ry,” ​“expen­sive,” and ​“ran­dom­ly and arbi­trar­i­ly sought by pros­e­cu­tors.” The doc­u­ment also rais­es con­cerns about the issue of inno­cence, not­ing that 156 peo­ple have been exon­er­at­ed from death row, and cap­i­tal pun­ish­men­t’s con­nec­tions to men­tal health and trau­ma, stat­ing, ​“many peo­ple on death row have men­tal ill­ness­es, cog­ni­tive lim­i­ta­tions, severe trau­ma his­to­ries, and pri­or crim­i­nal records, often direct­ly relat­ed to racial bias and pover­ty.” Other rec­om­men­da­tions relat­ed to crim­i­nal jus­tice include demil­i­ta­riza­tion of police, an end to pri­va­ti­za­tion of pris­ons, and an end to soli­tary con­fine­ment. The plat­form also con­tains sec­tions address­ing issues relat­ed to repa­ra­tions, eco­nom­ic jus­tice, polit­i­cal access, and invest­ment in Black com­mu­ni­ties. ​“We rec­og­nize that not all of our col­lec­tive needs and visions can be trans­lat­ed into pol­i­cy, but we under­stand that pol­i­cy change is one of many tac­tics nec­es­sary to move us towards the world we envi­sion, a world where free­dom and jus­tice is the real­i­ty,” said M Adams, the co-exec­u­tive direc­tor of Madison, Wisconsin-based Freedom, Inc. and one of the authors of the platform.

(“Platform,” The Movement for Black Lives, August 1, 2016; J. Kaleem, ​“Black Lives Matter has signed onto a plat­form in time for the pres­i­den­tial elec­tion. Here’s what it says,” Los Angeles Times, August 1, 2016; Y. Alcindor, ​“Black Lives Matter Coalition Makes Demands as Campaign Heats Up,” New York Times, August 1, 2016.) See Race and Arbitrariness.

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