It happened. Early this afternoon, at his office in Springfield, Illinois Gov. Pat Quinn signed into law Senate Bill 3539, ending Illinois' dysfunctional and broken death penalty system. The measure ends an embarrassing history in Illinois, during which 20 men sentenced to death have been exonerated and released from the state's death row.
Earlier this week, Illinois Governor Pat Quinn signed into law a bill that prohibits employers from requiring or requesting that employees or applicants reveal the username sand passwords for personal accounts on websites such as Facebook and Twitter. Governor Quinn, in signing the bill, said it was necessary to “protect workers and their right to personal privacy.” Illinois in is now the second state to enact this type legislation, following the lead of Maryland, which enacted a similar law in May.
This is a good week in Illinois. Yesterday, Gov. Pat Quinn announced that he would close the “supermax” facility at Tamms Correctional Facility, where prisoners are held in long-term solitary confinement.
On Thursday afternoon, the Illinois House of Representatives was a raucous place — with talk of a deal on a tax increase, Medicaid reform and proposed budget cuts all sweeping around the chamber, members created a cacophony of sound that echoed around the huge chamber. But late in the afternoon, as the House began to consider Senate Bill 3539 — a measure to end Illinois' broken death penalty system — the chamber became hushed. Every member seemed to grasp the importance of the debate, coming after a decade in which the State of Illinois has operated under a death penalty moratorium because so many innocent men were released from death row.
With little fanfare — and nearly no media attention — Illinois Governor Pat Quinn recently signed legislation that extends the collection of data by police of every motorist they stop. The measure was first adopted a few years ago under the leadership of President Barack Obama when he served in the Illinois State Senate. When asked earlier this summer about the arrest of Professor Henry Louis Gates, Jr., the President described this effort in his home state.
Those of us in Chicago — and across the nation — who share a fierce commitment to protecting freedom of expression lost a great champion this past weekend with the passing of Judith Krug. A librarian by training, Judith became a champion for the First Amendment whether it was confronting efforts to ban books in pubic libraries (including public school libraries), challenging efforts to force libraries to place clumsy, ineffective filters on public computers with internet access or critiquing the intrusive provisions of the USA PATRIOT Act, especially as those provisions affected library patrons.
On Tuesday, January 11, the Illinois Senate acted to address a national embarrassment for the state — our failed death penalty system. By a vote of 32 to 25, the Senate passed Senate Bill 3539, which repeals the death penalty in Illinois. The bill is now sitting on Gov. Pat Quinn's desk waiting for his signature to become law.
Randy Steidl is one of 20 men who've been exonerated and released from Illinois' death row in recent years. Last Tuesday, he and I sat just a few feet apart when the Illinois Senate passed Senate Bill 3539 — repealing the state's irretrievably broken death penalty system.
