Criminal Justice: New York Abolishes Death

In its 74 years at Sing Sing Prison, New York State's 2,000-volt electric chair has efficiently ended 614 lives. Last month opponents of capital punishment persuaded the state legislature to pass a bill abolishing execution for all but two classes of murderers—cop killers and life prisoners who kill guards or inmates while in jail or while trying to escape. Governor Nelson Rockefeller sharply criticized those exceptions as morally indefensible. "If the proponents admit that the death penalty is a deterrent in some cases," he asked, "then why not in others?"

Last week Rockefeller, who had been expected to veto the bill, joined a worldwide trend (TIME, April 2) by signing it into law with no further comment. At the same time, he planned to commute to life imprisonment the sentences of 17 of the 20 men now on Sing Sing's death row (three are convicted police killers). The death penalty already has been abolished in whole or in part in twelve other states—Alaska, Hawaii, Iowa, Maine, Michigan, Minnesota, North Dakota, Oregon, Rho.de Island, Vermont, Wisconsin, West Virginia. With the addition of New York, abolitionists have won over the most populous state thus far—and the one that developed the electric chair in the first place.