Take a moratorium resolution to your local government

2000 is the year to bring home the movement for a moratorium!

To date, 12 local governments have passed moratorium resolutions. Your town, city or county can be the next addition to the ever-growing tally of municipalities calling for a halt on executions!

Bringing a resolution before your local government is probably easier than you think and any resident can do it. Steve Dear of People of Faith Against the Death Penalty was surprised at how quickly resolutions were debated and adopted by three cities and one county in North Carolina. “It has actually proven easier to get local governments to consider resolutions than to get some churches,” Dear noted recently.

Public officials want to go on record as supporting basic fairness in our legal system. Here are some easy steps you can take to give yours the opportunity to do just that:

    1. Ask a local councilperson to introduce a moratorium resolution. Call us for copies of other municipal resolutions. Add any information that is pertinent to your state or county. Joe Byrne describes his experience in Mt. Rainier, MD: “All I had to do was contact my council-person and ask how I, as a city resident, should present a resolution. I sent her a copy of Equal Justice USA’s sample resolution and latest newsletter. It was on the agenda for the very next council meeting.”
    2. Line up support! Ask other local residents to come speak in support of your resolution and fill the room when it is debated. Let the introducing councilperson know that you are lining up support. Encourage people to focus their remarks on issues of basic fairness that underlie the need for a moratorium.
    3. Alert the local media if your resolution is passed. “With the adoption of each resolution,” shares Steve Dear of North Carolina, “we gained statewide media exposure and new allies.” Call us or visit www.quixote.org/ej for a sample press release.
    4. Make sure that copies of the ratified resolution get sent to state and national elected officials. Legislators pay attention to what local lawmakers are doing.
    5. Send us copies of ratified resolutions and resulting news stories so we can add your local government to the National Tally (www.quixote.org/ej/tally999.html).