NAACP Reaffirms Its Support of Abolishing the Death Penalty

WHEREAS, in 1970 and 2001 the NAACP approved resolutions in support of the abolition of the death penalty, and in 2009 the NAACP launched a campaign to reverse the trends of Black Americans on Death Row; and

WHEREAS, racial bias is still prevalent in the Criminal Justice System, and Black Americans are disproportionately given death sentences; and

WHEREAS, Black people are seven times more likely to be convicted of murders they did not commit; and

WHEREAS, in 2020 Black people made up 52% of those on Death row and only 13% of the United States population; and

WHEREAS, of approximately 2,400 people facing the death penalty today, more than 40% are Black and a majority are poor and/or have a mental health disorder; and  

WHEREAS, the death penalty is banned in only 21 states; and

WHEREAS, the practice of capital punishmentis rooted in the United States' ugly history of lynching; and

WHEREAS, between 1880 and 1918, more than 8 in 10 lynchings occurred in the South, and more than 8 in 10 of the nearly 1,400 legal executions carried out in this country since 1976 have been in the South; and

WHEREAS, racial bias is still prevalent in the Criminal Justice System, and Black Americans are disproportionately given death sentences; and

WHEREAS, the states that still maintain the death penalty also had the most incidents of lynching between 1883 and 1940; and

THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED the NAACP reaffirms its support of the abolition of the death penalty across the United States and calls for racial equity throughout the criminal justice system.

BE IT FINALLY RESOLVED the NAACP reaffirms its support of abolishing the death penalty across the United States and calls for racial equity throughout the criminal justice system.