People from across Texas will come to the Capitol in Austin to advocate for a bill to abolish the death penalty in Texas and other reforms that would impact the Texas death penalty, including bills to protect innocent people from wrongful convictions, a moratorium on executions, a commission to study the death penalty system, a bill to require separate trials in death penalty cases and a bill that would prohibit death sentences for people convicted under the Law of Parties who do not kill anyone.
This will be a day we will always remember, a day when we stood side by side fighting against the death penalty with people who were wrongfully convicted and sentenced to death. Don’t be one of those people who one day “shall think themselves accurs’d they were not here” and fought with us on the Lobby Day Against the Death Penalty. Register now!
Below is the schedule for Lobby Day. Please register for Lobby Day, so that we know how many people are coming and so that we can schedule legislative appointments. In 2009 and 2011, our Lobby Day resulted in several legislators signing on to support the bills we lobbied for. We expect the same success in 2013. We have held a Lobby Day every session since 2003.
Register for the Lobby Day Against the Death Penalty. You can also just show up without registering, but if you register, then we know how many people are coming and we can plan appointments with legislators.
If you can not attend the Lobby Day, you can still help by making a donation (not tax-deductible). Also on March 13, even if you are not in Austin at the Lobby Day, you can participate in our Statewide Call-in Day to Abolish the Death Penalty. Find out who represents you, then call your Texas legislators and let them know your position on the death penalty and urge them to support the bills to repeal the death penalty, HB 164 by Harold Dutton and HB 1703 by Jessica Farrar. The bills are identical and we support both. Call the members of the Committee on Criminal Jurisprudence and urge them to schedule a hearing on the bills to abolish the death penalty. One of our goals of Lobby Day is to convince the committee to hold a hearing.
If you have questions, call or text Hooman Hedayati.
Schedule of the 2013 Statewide Texas Lobby Day Against the Death Penalty
9-11 AM: Meet and Greet with death row exoneree Clarence Brandley, followed by lobby training as people arrive for lobby day and beginning of office visits as people complete training. Room E2.018 in the Capitol.
11 – Noon: Visiting Legislative Offices to Lobby
Noon: Press Conference in the Speaker’s Committee Room (2W.6). Special guests include State Rep. Harold Dutton, author of a bill to abolish the death penalty in Texas and State Rep. Lon Burnam, co-author of the bill to abolish the death penalty, as well as Clarence Brandley, an innocent person who spent ten years on Texas death row for a crime he did not commit.
1 PM: Lunch at your own expense in the Capitol cafeteria.
2-4:30 More lobbying visits to legislative offices.
4:30 PM Meet in the Capitol cafeteria to share stories about what everyone learned during the legislative lobbying visits.
6:30 PM SXSW Film Festival screening of new documentary “An Unreal Dream” about the case of Michael Morton, an innocent person who spent 25 years in prison wrongfully convicted of murdering his wife. You will need to buy your own tickets, which will go on sale at the theater before the showing. Tickets are limited, so you may not get in if it sells out.
Lobby Day has been organized since 2003 by several organizations working together, the same ones who also organize the annual “March to Abolish the Death Penalty”
each October: Texas Moratorium Network, Texas Death Penalty Abolition
Movement, Campaign to End the Death Penalty – Austin chapter, Texas
Students Against the Death Penalty.
Organizations that would like to participate or co-sponsor the Lobby Day can email admin@texasmoratorium.org or call 512-961-6389.
Call the members of the Committee on Criminal Jurisprudence and urge them to schedule a hearing on the bills to abolish the death penalty.
| Position | Member |
| Chair: | Rep. Abel Herrero email (512) 463-0462 |
| Vice Chair: | Rep. Stefani Carter email (512) 463-0454 |
| Members: | Rep. Lon Burnam email (512) 463-0740 |
| Rep. Terry Canales email (512) 463-0426 | |
| Rep. Bryan Hughes email (512) 463-0271 | |
| Rep. Jeff Leach email (512) 463-0544 | |
| Rep. Joe Moody email (512) 463-0728 | |
| Rep. Matt Schaefer email (512) 463-0584 | |
| Rep. Steve Toth email (512) 463-0797 |
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