tcask is supporting the effort in tennessee to pass legislation enacting a moratorium (i.e. a "time out") on executions while a comprehensive and non-partisan study is undertaken to identify the what and whys of tennessee's death penalty system failures - e.g. ineffective, unreliable, wrongful convictions of the innocent, huge diversion of taxpayer $$$ from law enforcement and victim's services, failure to give victims family members the opportunity to heal at the earliest possible moment, etc...

people ask us why? - we believe that the current discourse on the death penalty needs to be moved to new terrain if we are ever going to have a reasonable and rational conversation about capital punishment as a public policy response to murder... and the fact is you can't have conversations with people who currently claim to support the death penalty if they shut their ears (and minds) from the get go (which they do when the first sentence out of your mouth is "abolish the death penalty")...

we ask you to click here and make a tax-deductible donation to tcask on-line right now...

you can agree or disagree -- here's more support for this effort...

U.N. Human Rights Committee Urges U.S to Place Moratorium on Death Penalty

Citing the 1966 International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, a United Nations panel recommended that the United States impose a moratorium on executions. The report, issued on July 28 by the U.N. Human Rights Committee, stated the panel was "concerned by studies according to which the death penalty may be imposed disproportionately on ethnic minorities as well as on low-income groups, a problem which does not seem to be fully acknowledged."

The panel, made up of 18 independent experts who review the practices of 156 countries who have ratified the covenant, urged the U.S. to limit the number of crimes that carry a penalty of death to the most serious crimes. It also requested that the federal government assess the extent that death sentences are handed down disproportionately on minorities and poor people.

The U.S. mission issued a statement in response to the report, but did not specifically mention the committee's proposals relating to capital punishment.

Criticism by the panel brings no penalties beyond international scrutiny. The U.S. ratified the treaty in 1992 with a number of reservations, including provisions on the death penalty.