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HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES             H.C.R. NO.            
TWENTIETH LEGISLATURE, 2000                                
STATE OF HAWAII                                            
                                                             
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                     HOUSE  CONCURRENT
                        RESOLUTION
  REQUESTING THE MEMBERS OF HAWAII'S CONGRESSIONAL DELEGATION TO
    SEEK THE AMENDMENT OF FEDERAL CAPITAL PUNISHMENT LAWS TO
    EXEMPT HAWAII AND THE OTHER STATES THAT HAVE ABOLISHED THE
    DEATH PENALTY FROM THE COVERAGE OF THOSE LAWS.



 1        WHEREAS, although the Hawaii Territorial Legislature
 2   abolished the death penalty in 1957, Hawaii residents who
 3   commit certain drug-related murders may still be subject to the
 4   death penalty under federal law; and
 5   
 6        WHEREAS, the federal government has jurisdiction in
 7   certain drug trafficking crimes in which a murder has been
 8   committed under the federal Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1988 and the
 9   federal Death Penalty Act of 1994; and
10   
11        WHEREAS, the 1988 federal law authorizes the death penalty
12   in drug conspiracy murders, while the 1994 federal law expanded
13   the types of murder that could be prosecuted as capital cases,
14   including drug-related murder committed with a firearm; and
15   
16        WHEREAS, according to the nonprofit Death Penalty
17   Information Center in Washington, D.C., the number of federal
18   death penalty prosecutions has risen since the 1994 federal law
19   went into effect on January 1, 1995; and
20   
21        WHEREAS, although no one has yet been executed under these
22   federal laws, pending appeals and other challenges to the death
23   sentences, there are currently twenty-one men on federal death
24   row awaiting execution at the newly constructed federal death
25   chamber in Indiana; and
26   
27        WHEREAS, two of these men on federal death row are from
28   Massachusetts and Vermont, which are among the twelve states
29   that do not have capital punishment; and
30   
31        WHEREAS, Hawaii has had four cases that fall under the
32   1994 federal death penalty law.  United States Attorney General
33   Janet Reno declined to authorize the death penalty in two of
34   those cases, another man pleaded guilty to first-degree murder

 
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 1   in exchange for federal prosecutors dropping their death
 2   penalty prosecution, and there has been no decision in the
 3   fourth case, which involves the shooting death of an Army
 4   helicopter pilot; and
 5   
 6        WHEREAS, the federal government has the authority to
 7   recommend the death penalty in these cases, since they fall
 8   under the federal statutes authorizing capital punishment,
 9   which preempt state laws under the Supremacy Clause of the
10   United States Constitution; and
11   
12        WHEREAS, nevertheless, the federal laws authorizing the
13   death penalty, along with the prosecutorial decision to invoke
14   the death penalty in Hawaii, undermines Hawaii's decision to
15   abolish capital punishment that was made forty-three years ago;
16   and
17   
18        WHEREAS, the federal decision to authorize capital
19   punishment in effect reinstates the death penalty in Hawaii
20   through the back door, unfairly extending that penalty to
21   crimes that have traditionally been under local jurisdiction;
22   and
23   
24        WHEREAS, there is an immediate need to amend federal death
25   penalty statutes to exempt Hawaii and the other states that
26   have abolished the death penalty from the coverage of those
27   statutes; now, therefore,
28   
29        BE IT RESOLVED by the House of Representatives of the
30   Twentieth Legislature of the State of Hawaii, Regular Session
31   of 2000, the Senate concurring, that the members of Hawaii's
32   congressional delegation are requested to seek the amendment of
33   the federal Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1988, the Federal Death
34   Penalty Act of 1994, and any other federal capital punishment
35   legislation, to exempt Hawaii and the other states that have
36   abolished the death penalty from the coverage of those laws;
37   and
38   
39        BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that certified copies of this
40   Concurrent Resolution be transmitted to the President of the
41   United States, the President of the United States Senate, the
42   Speaker of the United States House of Representatives, and the
43   members of Hawaii's congressional delegation.
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47                           OFFERED BY: ___________________________