NAACP Legal Defense Fund Holds National Conference on Capital Punishment

    ress Release A 

= crisis upholding 

the co 

death 

her 

June 2, 1967. 

lators and 

now 

NAACP Legal Defense and Education Fund, Inc. | 10 Columbus Circle | New York, N.Y. 10019 | (212) 586-8397 

William T. Coleman, Jr. - President Jack Greenberg - Director-Counsel 



the ] t ick ies < helt ; fy 

same time. LDF at ieys | é a ¢ the Cot t th 

cedures employed by tate allo f i ch rt 

the sentencing proce 

Arbitrarines Ss in the record 

the country. Of the 2d in the 

1930, 2,066 have been black. Of the 455 =cuted 

been black. The majority of the present death row inmates are black 

Virtually all of the condemned are poor. 

The Court's recent decision reached only two of the issues by 

which LDF attorneys had been challenging the constitutionality of the 

death penalty throughout the country. Yet to be determined are: 

- Challenge to death penalty as cruel and unusual punis ent. 

» Challenge to racial discrimination in the imposition of the 

death penalty in rape cases 

h by a jury from which persons 

to capital punishment had been excl 

executed 

generally objecting 

uded -- could not be 

- Challenge to the procedures by which most states fail to 

provide indigent condemned men with counsel at the post- 

appeal stage in capital cases 

These issues were outlined in detail before the Supreme Court in 

a brief just filed by LDF on behalf of 23 condemned men whose cases 

are now pending in the Supreme Court of the United States. In that 

brief. LDF attorneys argue that "sub antial issues ... concerning 

the constitutionality of the death penalty anc the states' procedures 

for imposing it shov j be heard by this Court before the United States 

-- which has not conducted a legal e: cution since June, 1967 —- 

resumes killing these men and women, and in unprecedentea numbe 

(continued) 



bo 

LD. origi 

representation 

white ‘wome 

of 2,500 rap 

evid the 

cutive 

Niet ic yn I Lf t ¢ 

l ¢ > wit a detailed dis-— 

constitutional ition, the 

or Lbiliti action against 

on 12 avai Lty of 1ency procedures to 

th te 

ve been several extremely vital developments 

Yak indicated tl 

i1 roducé bill: an 

Congxr« for a two y morat m on execu 

tions id facts underlying 1e states' 

administration of capi nt relevant 

to 

a 

the 

Bill ng int fo} 

severa bol ty. 

Action -- Rec ly ¢ Win op Roc ller, prior 

sd the death sentences 

I 8) i Arkansas and 

ut the cy 

simi 

Attorney General Fred of ILA, 
pri *6 leaving c il an € i 

order declari 
w 1 punisi ordering ai 
St tie ee chai i orc 

prisone € i gene 

populatior The death che t ov cor 

a psytholo “s¢ 

nally became- involve in capital punish thre 

of southern blac s ed tt th for the rape of 

An 6€xtensive study, ducted @ v 

cases over a 20 perio rodu ce 

the h p 

fx n the s i In th contex he < } 



to all th deat rol nmat 

; < ’ Lf more than half nation's 

tanc ready to do whatever possible to stop cutions 

of state infl 

It legitimatizes a method of coping with probl 

ires proceé of a just society. It must be 

sty is to move away from violence. Surely the 

1 be eventually eliminated in this country as it has 

futil z2d countries. tow. mu in almost all ci 

and indefensftble it “is than it has ever been snseles 

chosen few who must die in the few poor, arb 

that histor dy repudiated. 

-—--00-—- 

J {NOT: A copy of Mr.’ Greenberg