Catholic group praises California for ‘largest commutation in history’ as hundreds spared execution

The prominent anti-death penalty group Catholic Mobilizing Network praised California Gov. Gavin Newsom on Nov. 5 for his commutation of the death sentences of every prisoner on the state’s death row.

In a publicly released letter, Newsom said he had “decided to exercise [his] constitutional clemency authority to commute all California death sentences to life without the possibility of parole.”

The Democratic governor, who identifies as Catholic, said in the letter that he had come to “firmly believe that state-sanctioned killing is incompatible with California’s values,” that it “undermines the foundations of our legal system,” and that it “diminishes each of us.”

The governor described life in prison without parole as “the most severe punishment I can lawfully impose.” The convicted criminals “will die in prison but not by our hand,” he said.

The commutation covered all 548 prisoners condemned to death in the state. Newsom’s executive order in 2019 ensured executions would not occur while he remained governor.

Responding to the news on Nov. 5, Krisanne Vaillancourt Murphy, executive director of Catholic Mobilizing Network, called the decision “an incredibly encouraging and historic witness for life and human dignity.” She described the order as “the largest commutation in world history.”

The Catholic group regularly advocates death sentence commutations and the national abolition of the death penalty itself. The Catechism of the Catholic Church states bluntly that the death penalty is “inadmissible because it is an attack on the inviolability and dignity of the person.”

Vaillancourt Murphy in her statement said the mass clemency “demonstrates how justice can be rooted in mercy and restoration instead of death and retribution.”

Newsom “has given each of [the condemned criminals] a tangible sign of hope and a chance for rehabilitation,” she said.

The decision “underscores the sacred value” of the lives of the prisoners, she said, though she stressed the need to “bear witness to the incomparable suffering that the families and loved ones of murder victims endure.”

“We hear the cry for justice and accountability that grave harm rightly deserves, and we continue to hold them in prayer,” Vaillancourt Murphy said.

Newsom in his statement noted that the state Supreme Court will have to weigh in on some of the commutations according to the state constitution, though the governor said he was “confident that this act of categorical clemency” was in line with state law.