A Penalty the People Do Not Want

Attorney General John Ashcroft's authorization of two death penalty prosecutions in the District highlights how out of step federal officials can be with the will of the people.

 In a 1992 referendum, D.C. voters overwhelmingly rejected reinstituting the death penalty, and a legislative initiative on the death penalty in the D.C. Council in 1997 was similarly defeated. The federally appointed U.S. attorney should not be able to circumvent the will of the District's people simply by filing his indictment in federal district court rather than in Superior Court.

 No compelling federal interest justifies this action. Nor does public safety, because the only alternative sentence for a defendant convicted of a federal capital crime is life without the possibility of parole.

In addition, while the federal government has sought the death penalty in the federal courts of a number of states that, like the District, have elected not to have the death penalty, the District's situation is different. Those states, through their elected representatives in Congress, participate in the legislative process that established and maintains the federal death penalty. Because of their disenfranchisement, D.C. citizens cannot vote for or against the federal laws under which D.C. citizens may be prosecuted.

Finally, even the Justice Department has acknowledged the glaring racial and geographic disparities in the implementation of the federal death penalty. The call for a nationwide moratorium pending a thorough review of the fairness of the federal capital punishment process comes not only from death-penalty abolitionists but from supporters of the death penalty who are concerned about the equitable administration of justice.

 Ashcroft has ultimate discretion as to whether the death penalty is sought in a case. He should respect the will of the District's people and their democratically elected representatives by reversing his decision to allow the death penalty to be sought in Washington.