By BOB RAY SANDERS
bobray@star-telegram.com
Former Texas Gov. Mark White did last week what he could never have done during his two campaigns for state attorney general and three bids for the governor’s office.
He said it is time for Texas to rethink the use of capital punishment and replace the death penalty with life in prison.
You see, no one can run a successful statewide campaign in Texas — the death penalty capital of the country — without being for capital punishment. Just ask any of the candidates already running for governor in next year’s election. They wouldn’t dare come out against the ultimate legal penalty.
Even the late Ann Richards, a compassionate soul indeed, felt compelled to talk tough like the good ol’ boys and declare her stand in favor of this barbaric practice.
When White ran his third race for governor, in 1990, facing Richards in the Democratic primary, he actually bragged about the people who were executed on his watch.
Nineteen people were put to death by the state while he was governor, between 1983 and 1987.
During an interview on National Public Radio last week, he was reminded of the commercial he ran in that race, which Richards ultimately won.
Melissa Block, host of
All Things Considered, began the conversation by saying, "I’m going to play for you part of a campaign ad from back in 1990 when you ran again. You lost in the Democratic primary, and the ad shows you walking along the portraits of people who were executed while you were governor. Let’s listen."
The sound bite from the ad has White saying, "These hardened criminals will never again murder, rape or deal drugs. As governor, I made sure they received the ultimate punishment: death. And Texas is a safer place for it."
White’s change of heart last week, coming after national news coverage about the 2004 execution of a man who might have been innocent, was heralded by death penalty opponents, including Amnesty International USA.
"The evolution of Governor White’s views on the death penalty in Texas is welcomed news, and it mirrors the change that is taking place nationwide," the human rights organization said in a statement. "As advances in DNA and forensic science have revealed the extent to which our criminal justice system is prone to error, judges, jurors, the public and even some politicians, have begun to question the wisdom of resorting to capital punishment. Those who once supported the death penalty are now significantly less sure."
With the growing number of exonerations of convicted people in Texas — two others from Dallas County announced last week — one can’t help but wonder, "How many innocent people have been put to death for a crime they did not commit?"
The Texas case getting a lot of scrutiny now — partly because Gov. Rick Perry overreacted to a state commission’s investigation of it — is that of Cameron Todd Willingham, convicted of killing his three young daughters in a fire. He was executed five years ago.
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