Oregon governor John Kitzhaber announces moratorium on executions

The exe­cu­tion of a Ore­gon man con­vict­ed of two mur­ders — who has been on death row for some time — will not go for­ward as planned on Decem­ber 6th, Gov­er­nor John Kitzhaber announced this after­noon, invok­ing his author­i­ty under the Beaver State’s Con­sti­tu­tion to block prison offi­cials from putting Gary Hau­gen to death.

But Kitzhaber did­n’t stop there. He also said that he has has decid­ed to impose a mora­to­ri­um on all exe­cu­tions while he remains governor.

His coura­geous action is a major vic­to­ry for civ­il lib­er­ties in the Pacif­ic North­west, one that is deserv­ing of recog­ni­tion and applause.

Speak­ing at a packed news con­fer­ence, Kitzhaber explained that he could not, in good con­science, allow the state he leads to put anoth­er pris­on­er to death on his watch. Here’s an excerpt from the sub­stan­tive, thought­ful remarks he deliv­ered.

The real­i­ty is that Oregon’s death row is an extreme­ly expen­sive life prison term, like­ly sev­er­al times more expen­sive that the life terms of oth­ers who hap­pen to have been sen­tenced to life in prison with­out the pos­si­bil­i­ty of parole — rather than the death penalty.

And while it may be con­ve­nient to blame lengthy and expen­sive death penal­ty tri­als and appeals on inmates “work­ing the sys­tem,” the truth is courts (and soci­ety) con­tin­ue to rein­ter­pret when, how and under what cir­cum­stances it is accept­able for the state to kill some­one. Over time, those options are narrowing.

Courts are apply­ing stricter stan­dards and con­tin­u­al­ly rais­ing the bar for pros­e­cut­ing death penal­ty cas­es. Con­sid­er that it was only six years ago that the U.S. Supreme Court reversed itself and held that it is uncon­sti­tu­tion­al to impose cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment on those under the age of 18. For a state intent on main­tain­ing a death penal­ty, the inevitable result will be big­ger ques­tions, few­er options and high­er costs.

It is time for Ore­gon to con­sid­er a dif­fer­ent approach. I refuse to be a part of this com­pro­mised and inequitable sys­tem any longer; and I will not allow fur­ther exe­cu­tions while I am Governor. 

Empha­sis is ours.

Abo­li­tion­ists in Ore­gon and across the Unit­ed States hailed the news.

“This action, while coura­geous on the part of Gov­er­nor Kitzhaber, also is in line with move­ment across this coun­try for states to either repeal their death penal­ty, lessen the use of the death penal­ty and or cre­ate oppor­tu­ni­ties to study the death penal­ty. Gov­er­nor Kitzhaber has shown great lead­er­ship with this announce­ment,” said Rob Stein­er, Board Chair of Ore­go­ni­ans for Alter­na­tives to the Death Penalty.

We at NPI strong­ly com­mend this deci­sion. State-spon­sored killing is immoral, unjust, and cost­ly. It is a bar­bar­ic prac­tice that needs to end.

We thank Gov­er­nor John Kitzhaber for inter­ven­ing to save the life of Gary Hau­gen and Ore­gon’s oth­er death row inmates. While the mora­to­ri­um announced today does not mean that so-called cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment has been abol­ished, it at least means that the State of Ore­gon won’t be killing any­one in the near future.

We urge the Ore­gon Leg­is­la­ture to join Gov­er­nor Kitzhaber in tak­ing a stand for civ­il lib­er­ties by approv­ing leg­is­la­tion out­law­ing the death penal­ty in Oregon.

POSTSCRIPT: The Eugene Reg­is­ter-Guard has a nice edi­to­r­i­al sup­port­ing Kitzhaber’s deci­sion and call­ing for reform of the crim­i­nal jus­tice system.