Readers React: Barbaric? Maybe, but voters like capital punishment
To the editor: The Times’ editorial suggesting that the California Legislature abolish the death penalty is idealistic. This won’t happen. (“Kinder, gentler forms of capital punishment are still barbaric,” editorial, March 27)
An initiative abolishing the death penalty was submitted to state voters in 2012. Proposition 34 was defeated by voters 52% to 48%. One of the influential and outspoken opponents in this emotional issue was Marc Klaas, whose 12-year-old daughter, Polly Klaas, was kidnapped and strangled to death in 1993.
Capital punishment may be a barbaric act, but it’s still what voters want. The real fix is for the United States to uniformly outlaw capital punishment at the national level and not leave it up to the states. But that also won’t happen any time soon.
Although your editorial calls it a “farce” to seek more humane execution protocols, perhaps that’s not such a bad idea.
William Goldman, Palos Verdes Estates
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