Social justice news—March 2000

Social justice news
March 2000

Death penalty leads to confused states
Support for the death penalty erodes
Wal-mart's unkind cut follows union vote
Who's hungry now?
What's drugs got to do with it?
Celebrate International Women's Day!
More voices raised against Iraq sanctions
Seattle Part II

Death penalty leads to confused states
Governor George Ryan's January announcement to suspend executions in Illinois sent ripples throughout the country, encouraging both federal and state legislators to take a closer look at the death penalty. Yet even as troubling questions are raised about the death penalty, some states are moving with greater speed toward more executions.

Ryan announced Illinois' moratorium after the state released Steve Manning, the 13th death row inmate to be exonerated in Illinois since 1977. A long-time supporter of the death penalty, he called the current system "broken."

Ryan's actions in Illinois, a state where more than 160 people are on death row, may help legislators push through similar moratoriums in other states. Already legislation for 2-year moratoriums has been introduced in Missouri, New Jersey, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, and Washington, while Kentucky and New Hampshire each are considering bills to repeal the death penalty.

In other states, however, current legislation favors speeding up the process leading to execution. In January the Florida legislature approved the Death Penalty Reform Act of 2000 proposed by Governor Jeb Bush. Based on a law in Texas, where there have been 119 executions during Bush's brother George W.'s two terms in office, the law reduces the time between sentencing and execution to five years. In January, Florida legislators also made lethal injection the primary means of execution in an effort to quell the controversy that erupted after the state's electric chair produced gruesome displays during at least two executions.

This February members of Colorado's state house approved a bill that would reduce the 3-judge panel, which under the current system reviews capital cases and is empowered to impose death sentences, to a single judge. Since the 3-judge panel system was introduced in 1995 the death penalty has been considered six times and death sentences imposed twice. The 1995 law was introduced because, as the Denver Post reported, some legislators felt that "Colorado juries were not imposing the death penalty often enough."

On the federal level Clinton has called Ryan's suspension of the death penalty in Illinois "courageous," but the president has made it clear that he sees no need for a nation-wide moratorium. Clinton did say during a February press conference that he is "favorably disposed" toward the Innocence Protection Act of 2000 introduced by Patrick Leahy (D-Vermont). The bill would make it easier for inmates to have DNA evidence tested as new technology is introduced for use in the appeals process. The legislation also called for court-appointed attorneys to be held to higher standards.

The first federal prisoner on death row to face execution in 36 years is currently filing a complaint with Inter-American Commission on Human Rights in Washington D.C. Juan Raul Garza claims the U.S. violated his rights by introducing evidence that he committed several unsolved murder cases in Mexico, although Garza was never prosecuted or convicted for those crimes. Garza will be executed unless President Clinton grants him clemency.

The debate over death penalty is not likely to cool within the United States anytime soon. Meanwhile, 98 people were executed in the U.S. in 1999, the most in a single year since the death penalty was reinstated in 1976. In the same year capital punishment was abolished in Albania, Turkmenistan, and the Ukraine.—Maria Hickey

Support for death penalty erodes
The Chicago Tribune reports that support for the death penalty has seriously declined among Illinois voters. A Tribune poll has found that support for capital punishment has fallen to 58 percent. That's a drop from the 76 percent who said they supported capital punishment in an August 1994 Tribune poll and from 63 percent a year ago.

When respondents were asked to choose whether murder cases should be punished by the death penalty or life in prison without possibility of parole, support for capital punishment eroded further, with 43 percent supporting the death penalty and 41 percent favoring life without parole. The numbers mirror a similar decline nationwide.

A Gallup poll released last month showed that 66 percent of Americans support capital punishment, down from 80 percent six years ago. Since Illinois reinstated capital punishment in 1977, 13 Death Row inmates have been exonerated while 12 have been executed.

Richard Dieter, the executive director of the Death Penalty Information Center, told the Tribune that the declining support for the death penalty was not unexpected in light of the exoneration of Death Row prisoners. "The awareness that there are innocent people on Death Row and the system is not always finding those people . . . that gives people pause," he said. "They may not have changed their moral view. But this is about how the death penalty works in practice, not theory."—Get the complete story

Wal-mart's unkind cut follows union vote
After workers in one Texas meat department voted to join the United Food and Commerical Workers union and workers in another Texas store filed to organize a union election, Wal-mart announced on March 3 that it would close all of its in-store meat cutting operations throughout the United States.

Wal-mart, legendary in corporate lore for its opposition to unionism, plans to only offer precut, "case ready" meats in its stores in a move that will effect employees in 180 stores nationwide. "Case-ready meats" are cut, produced, and wrapped at off-site, typically nonunion meat processing operations.

Wal-mart officials denied the move was related to the union vote, but UFCW officials remain unconvinced, charging the company was trying to block future membership drives by meat workers that could open the door to organizing other employees. "This is a move by Wal-Mart to suppress workers expressing their voice in the workplace," said UFCW spokesman Greg Denier.

Wal-mart, the world's biggest retailer, had remained union-free during its long conquest of American commerce until the February 18 UFCW vote. Employees in the Jacksonville, Texas Wal-Mart Supercenter's meat department voted 7-to-3 to join the UFCW Local 540, becoming the first U.S. Wal-Mart employees to gain union representation. Workers at the nearby Palestine, Texas Superstore later indicated their interest in conducting a union vote.

At the time UFCW President Douglas H. Dority called the election "the vote heard 'round the world" and predicted, "This victory could open the floodgates of pent-up worker frustration at the abusive treatment, low pay, and lousy benefits at Wal-Mart."

It appears Wal-mart executives agreed—at least about the floodgate.

Wal-mart has recently announced record profits, but hourly wages at Wal-Mart average $2 to $3 less than at unionized supermarkets. Wal-Mart is the largest private employer in the U.S. with almost 900,000 employees, yet fewer than 40 percent of its workers are covered by the company's health plan.

The change to case-ready beef is being made in six southcentral states, including Texas, after a successful test run in Arkansas, a Wal-Mart spokesperson told Reuters. "The decision to expand this program has nothing to do with what happened in Jacksonville," the spokesperson said, "It's something we've been working on for months."

Union officials said the move would only energize their efforts to organize the Palestine, Texas workers, as well as other locations nationwide. "What this means for other workers is that they won't have a say in what happens to them unless they unionize. Wal-Mart is sending a clear signal to them that they need a voice in the decisions that impact their lives at work," Denier said.

U.S. workers are not the only Wal-mart employees who have a beef with the company. According to the National Labor Committee, workers all over the world endure low-pay, sweatshop conditions, and outright physical abuse preparing goods for Wal-mart.

Who's hungry now?
Despite the booming economy in the United States, millions of Americans still go bed hungry, according to a number of recent studies about hunger. Among the findings:

One in 10 American households is unable to afford the food it needs, according to a Bread for the World study. Although hunger has decreased worldwide in the last 25 years, 791 million people in the world still face hunger as a regular fact of life.

Some 30 million Americans worry about where they will get their next meal, says a Tufts University report. Demand for emergency food rose 18 percent in 1999, according to a survey of 26 cities by the U.S. Conference of Mayors. Of those requesting food, 67 percent were employed and 58 percent were children and their parents.

In New York City, over 1,400 hungry children are turned away from food pantries each day, reports the New York Coalition Against Hunger. The coalition saw a 36 percent increase in people needing emergency food services last year.

In an effort to combat hunger, Bread for the World's nationwide campaign, called "Hunger 2000," seeks improvements in the federal Food Stamp program, an increase in the minimum wage by $1 per hour, and more government spending for anti-hunger programs.

"The level of effort required to end widespread hunger is relatively small," the Bread for the World report said. Spending just $18 per person per year would end hunger in America, it said, while an extra $1 billion a year would pay America's share of fighting world hunger.

The organization is asking church members to write letters to Congress pushing hunger issues. Another way churches—and families—can help alleviate world hunger is through Operation Rice Bowl, an annual Lenten program sponsored by Catholic Relief Services. The program offers a concrete way for Catholics to put their faith into action through prayer, fasting, and almsgiving.

Originally conceived by Msgr. Robert Coll of Allentown, Pennsylvania as a response to the African drought of 1974-75, Operation Rice Bowl is marking its 25th anniversary this year. In its history, it has raised $105 million for development projects in 60 countries and the United States. (Find out how you can get involved.)

This year's theme is "Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for justice, for they shall have their fill . . ." Materials for families include a cardboard "rice bowl" bank and a home calendar guide with recipes and activity suggestions. Parishes may request posters, educator's guides, videos, and displays. Most materials are available in Spanish as well as English.

To obtain Operation Rice Bowl materials, call 800-736-3467 or visit Catholic Relief Services.—Heidi Schlumpf

Celebrate International Women's Day: Help pass CEDAW
The Convention to End the Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) was approved by the United Nations in 1979. Even though the United States had a significant role in the writing of this document and 165 Nations have signed on to it, the U.S. has not ratified it—the only major industrial nation that has not signed it along with Iran and Sudan, where women's rights are in a deplorable state.

The United States promised at the 1995 Fourth International Conference for Women to have this signed by 2000, but the Foreign Relations Committee chairperson, Senator Jesse Helms, has openly proclaimed that he will not even consider allowing it to be discussed by his committee that initiates all treaties and UN documents.

On November 19, 1999 Senator Barbara Boxer of California with seven other women senators introduced S. Res. 237 expressing the sense of the Senate that the Foreign Relations Committee should hold Hearings and act on CEDAW by March 8, 2000, International Women's Day.

Action: Call or write your Senators (local and/or Washington office) and ask that they support S.Res. 237. Congress Toll Free Phone Number: 877-722-7494 or 888.449-3511. View sample letter.

For the e-mail address of your senator, visit: www.congress.org or www.capweb.net.

More voices raised against Iraq sanctions
Last month Congress members asked President Clinton to ease nonmilitary sanctions on Iraq, insisting children were suffering needlessly and President Saddam Hussein's regime was benefiting from the measures. "It could be argued that the sanctions have in fact strengthened the regime and weakened the people who would be needed to overthrow the regime," Rep. Dennis Kucinich, D-Ohio, said at a February 16 news conference outside the Capitol.

Rep. John Conyers Jr., D-Michigan, has introduced a bill that would permit the export of food and medicine to Iraq. The bill is supported by 70 other lawmakers.

For more Iraq:
AP coverage of protests at the UN and von Sponeck's resignation
AP report on Hans von Sponeck from 1-13-99
Background on Hans von Sponeck
AP on the resignation of Jutta Burghardt of the WFP
Reuters on the Resignation of Jutta Burghardt of the WFP

Learn more about sanctions:
www.nonviolence.org
www.leb.net/iac

Read Kevin Clarke's comments on the Iraqi sanctions in U.S. Catholic's Margin Notes: War by another name.

Actions (recommended by the 8th Day Center for Justice):
Contact local media and demand that they cover these stories. Grass roots efforts helped publicize Halliday's resignation and enabled him to speak out against the sanctions across the U.S. and Europe. Please write a letter today to the editor and call your local paper to urge them to cover these stories.

According to theAssociated Press, Minority Whip David E. Bonior, D-Michigan, called the current sanctions "infanticide masquerading as policy." A report from the United Nations' Children's Emergency Fund said several thousand children under the age of 5 die each month from malnutrition in Iraq. "Our message is simple. We're saying: Millions of children are suffering and we refuse to close our eyes to the slaughter of innocents," Bonior said.

Hans von Sponeck, coordinator of the Oil for Food program in Iraq, and Jutta Burghardt, head of the World Food Program in Iraq, both resigned from their posts in protest of the economic sanctions and the U.N. Security Council Resolution 1284. Von Sponeck's resignations comes just 14 months after the resignation of his predecessor, Denis Halliday, who has called the sanctions "genocide" because they are taking the lives of 4-5,000 children monthly, despite the U.N.'s Oil-for-Food program.

Three hundred persons from throughout the country held a nonviolent protest at the US mission to the UN in New York City, and 86 were arrested for conducting a teach-in on the steps of the mission, declaring it the "scene of a crime" against the people of Iraq. All were released pending a court appearance in a few weeks.

"I think this is the worst case of child abuse today," said Bert Sacks, 58, a protester from Seattle who has traveled to Iraq a half-dozen times bringing medicine in violation of the sanctions. Over 30 delegations have traveled to Iraq for this purpose. Their actions carry a possible sentence of 12 years imprisonment and $1 million fine.

Seattle part II
A powerful U.S. movement for economic and human rights and fair trade may have had its coming-out party at the bedeviled World Trade Organization meetings in Seattle. It may gain new momentum from demonstrations planned between April 9 and 16 before the institutional powerhouses of international economic "order": the U.S. Treasury, the International Monetary Fund, and the World Bank.

Many of the same unions and nongovernmental human rights, labor, and environmental organizations that challenged the intentions and priorities of the WTO in Seattle are helping to organize this latest demonstration against the direction of profit-driven globalization.

The 8th Day Center for Justice calls this "unholy trinity" of economic institutional authority the "chief instruments used by political and corporate elites to create today's unjust, destructive global economic order." Since the end of World War II, the World Bank and the IMF have been quietly writing the rules that their critics charge keep the world safe for multinational corporations while economically depriving billions around the world. Most notably, the Structural Adjustment Programs of the IMF have forced governments in the developing world to cut social services (education, health, etc), devalue currencies, and restructure their economies to favor export, multinational investment, and speculative finance interest.

The days of protest, education, training, and direct action during the week of April 9-16 begins on Sunday, April 9th with a Jubilee 2000, USA mobilization for cancellation of the debts of African, Latin American, Asia-Pacific and Caribbean countries, and continues with teach-ins and training on the global economy. It will culminate with a rally at IMF headquarters on Sunday, April 16, when the IMF and World Bank will be meeting.

For more info, visit 50 Years is Enough Network or call them (in Washington) at 202-IMF-Bank or Global Exchange (San Francisco) at 415-558-9486, x. 254.

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