2003: Draft of S.B. 972, a bill calling for a two-year moratorium on executions in North Carolina
In 2003, North Carolina State Senator Eleanor "Ellie" Kinnaird sponsored a bill (S.B. 972) in the North Carolina State Senate to institute a two-year moratorium on capital punishment for the purpose of studying the inequities in capital sentencing along racial, economic, and geographic lines. The moratorium bill was supported by over 750 endorsers, including the cities of Charlotte, Greensboro, and Chapel Hill, and Orange and Durham counties. The Senate passed the bill, but it was later defeated in the North Carolina House of Representatives.
This is a note written by Senator Kinnaird asking a colleague to draft the moratorium bill. Senator Kinnaird's note is followed by an early two-page draft of the bill.
Eleanor Kinnaird Papers, #5356, Southern Historical Collection, Wilson Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
2003
Ca. 1983: Pages from typed draft of "Preserving the Constitution: the Autobiography of Senator Sam J. Ervin, Jr." (excerpt includes pages 167-170)
This text is from a chapter titled "Illustrative Judicial Aberrations." Ervin, the former judge and N.C. Supreme Court justice, argues that the decision in Furman v Georgia was flawed in that the majority did not rightly consider the intent of the framers of the 8th amendment to the Constitution. He further suggests that each justice in the majority should have been deterred by noting that "none of his predecessors was smart enough to make such a discovery [that capital punishment constitutes cruel and unusual punishment] during the 181 years between December 15, 1791...and June 29, 1972." Ervin goes on to condemn "activist" judges, and to suggest that death is a proper punishment for inflicting death, and that capital punishment does deter at least in the sense of preventing any further crimes by the executed. He joins Walter Clark, one-time chief justice of the N.C. Supreme Court, in declaring that "Enough has been done for those who murder; it is time to do something for those who do not wish to be murdered."
Sam Ervin Jr. Papers, #3847, Southern Historical Collection, Wilson Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
1983
23 November 1973: Mailgram from Lucy Kerns, Alexandria, Va., to Senator Sam Ervin.
Ms. Kerns writes to Sen. Ervin as a supporter of the death penalty with a relative who has been raped and murdered. She argues that if young people in North Carolina "do not see justice done...could you blame them for looking toward Communism or anything else for leadership?" She appeals to Ervin as "the lifelong 'Master Defender' of the Constitution."
Sam Ervin Jr. Papers, #3847, Southern Historical Collection, Wilson Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
November 23, 1973
5 May 1973: Letter from Thomas Smith, Hudson, N.C., to Senator Sam Ervin
Mr. Smith takes the position on capital punishment opposite Ms. O'Bryant's, arguing that the death penalty should be imposed as a deterrent and "that some national, uniform bill concerning capital punishment should be enacted." Ervin responded substantially as he did to Ms. O'Bryant.
Sam Ervin Jr. Papers, #3847, Southern Historical Collection, Wilson Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
May 5, 1973
5 May 1973: Letter from Linda F. O'Bryant, Reidsville, N.C., to Senator Sam Ervin Jr.
After the Furman decision, while executions were halted nationwide, constituents and others contacted Senator Ervin with their opinions about capital punishment. Ms. O'Bryant, a college student, argues that "capital punishment does not seem to be the answer to our crime rate," and that a murderer "needs help and at the same time society needs protection." Ervin responded that he believed that capital punishment should be retained as a deterrent and that, to this end, he supported Senate Bill S.1401.
Sam Ervin Jr. Papers, #3847, Southern Historical Collection, Wilson Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
May 5, 1973
4 October 1973: Press Release #978, "Senator Sam Ervin Says."
Ervin expresses his support for Senate Bill S.1401 and his opinion on capital punishment.
Sam Ervin Jr. Papers, #3847, Southern Historical Collection, Wilson Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
October 4, 1973
27 March 1973: U.S. Senate Bill S.1401. (detail)
Senator Ervin co-sponsored this bill, intended "To establish rational criteria for the mandatory imposition of the sentence of death..." by federal courts in cases of murder and treason. It was proposed in response to the Furman v. Georgia decision.
Sam Ervin Jr. Papers, #3847, Southern Historical Collection, Wilson Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
March 27, 1973
25 January 1963: Paul Green to Ruby E. McArthur.
Paul Green's response to Ruby McArthur's letter of 2 January 1963. His response is characteristically personal and empathetic.
January 25, 1963
2 January 1962: Ruby McArthur to Paul Green
McArthur's husband was murdered in 1961. She writes to author Paul Green in response to a newspaper editorial he had written calling for an end to the death penalty. McArthur shares her tragic experience with Green and explains why she supports capital punishment.
Paul Green Papers, #3693, Southern Historical Collection, Wilson Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
January 2, 1962
21 June 1961: Jeanne E. Marion to Paul Green.
Green often received letters challenging his public opposition to capital punishment. Here Jeanne Marion writes, "I know from reading your writings that you are a brilliant and educated man, but are you really honest and sincere in your stance on capital punishment? Would you feel the same if members of your family were among these killed by vicious, irresponsible men? I can't believe you would."
June 21, 1961
17 November 1953: W.A. Stanbury to Paul Green.
Following an editorial written by Paul Green, published in the Greensboro Daily News, Reverend W.A. Stanbury of Asheboro, N.C., writes to Green, "More than a quarter of a century ago, when serving as pastor of a church in Raleigh, I walked down the last mile with the Stewarts, father and son...If ever men deserved the ultimate in punishment, they did; but I came back from that experience with the firm conviction which has never been shaken, that capital punishment is an unspeakably primitive method of dealing with criminals..."
Paul Green Papers, #3693, Southern Historical Collection, Wilson Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
November 17, 1953
1953: "Letters from boys condemned to die..."
In the late 1940s, Paul Green compiled excerpts from these letters from condemned death row prisoners which, as the document states, were "usually written on the night before their execution the next morning." The excerpt shown here is a letter from condemned inmate Lloyd Daniels to his mother.
Paul Green Papers, #3693, Southern Historical Collection, Wilson Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
1953
17 May 1945: Paul Green to Governor R. Gregg Cherry.
In May 1945, Green wrote to North Carolina Governor R. Gregg Cherry supporting Cherry's decision to commute the sentence of condemned inmate William Dunheen from death to life in prison. Dunheen, eighteen at the time, was given a medical discharge from the army in 1944. Soon thereafter, Dunheen shot and killed his girlfriend. In a statement following the commutation, Governor Cherry stated that he believed that the murder was brought on by a mental illness caused by Dunheen's epilepsy. Green writes, "I will not live to see it, but perhaps my children will -- the relegation of such instruments as the electric chair, the gas chamber (the pellet and the bowl) relegated to the museum as an inspiration to a new age and a warning to our young people as to the blindness in which a former generation walked." In August 2000, as Green had predicted, the gas chamber was removed from Central Prison and the execution chairs were later given to the North Carolina Museum of History, where they are housed today.
Paul Green Papers, #3693, Southern Historical Collection, Wilson Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
May 17, 1945
18 November 1942: Paul Green to E.M. Land.
E.M. Land was the prosecuting attorney in the trial of William Mason Wellmon, a black laborer who was convicted and sentenced to die in 1941 for the rape of sixty-seven-year-old white farmer Cora Sowers. In his defense, Wellmon stated that he was at work on a construction project in nearby Fort Belvoir, Va., at the time of the rape, and that he had proof that he could not have been present (in the form of an envelope for his wages that he had signed that same day at the construction site). In this letter to Prosecuting Attorney Land, Green points out a number of unsettling inconsistencies in the case such as the missing signed envelope and the fact that the victim failed to identify Wellmon from a lineup. Green later convinced Governor J. Melville Broughton to investigate Wellmon's claims of innocence. Wellmon was held in Central Prison for nearly two years before Governor Broughton pardoned him on 15 April 1943.
Paul Green Papers, #3693, Southern Historical Collection, Wilson Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
November 18, 1942
20 May 1934: Paul Green to Governor J.C.B. Ehringhaus
In September 1933, Emanuel Bittings (or Biddings), a black tenant farmer and World War I veteran, shot his landlord T.M. Clayton in an argument apparently over Clayton's ordering Bittings to move some tobacco into a packhouse. Bittings testified that he shot Clayton only after Clayton threatened his life and then reached for a pistol. In January 1934, Bittings was tried, convicted, and sentenced to death in Roxboro. Later in this letter, Green writes to Governor Ehringhaus, "I am making a plea for clemency for the negro in case he is not granted a new trial....only public sentiment and your executive power can save Biddings from the electric chair." Bittings was executed on September 28, 1934.
Paul Green Papers, #3693, Southern Historical Collection, Wilson Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
May 20, 1934
5 May 1934: Paul Green to A.P. Kephart.
During the 1920s and 1930s Paul Green was not unequivocally opposed to the death penalty. Green biographer Laurence G. Avery points out in his book, A Paul Green Reader, that Green's views began to shift in the mid-1930s as he began to feel that "no absolute punishment should be based on less than absolute knowledge." (Avery, 237) In this letter from 1934, Green expresses his views at the time, writing, "I am not entirely against capital punishment as such, for from the true horticulturist point of view there are evil members to be pruned out, but I am absolutely opposed to it...as it is carried out in North Carolina."
Paul Green Papers, #3693, Southern Historical Collection, Wilson Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
May 5, 1934
Ellie Kinnaird
1997
Sam Ervin, Jr.
n.d.
Paul Green
ca. 1970
Allen Foster
ca. 935
Nell Battle Lewis
ca. 1918
Reprint of "Frankie Silver's Confession"
The Lenoir Topic
1886
Marion Wright to Reverend Billy Graham
1970
Lloyd Ray Daniels to his mother
1953
Stay of execution for Velma Barfield
12 March 1982