our mission

Founded in 1997, Pennsylvania Abolitionists United Against the Death Penalty (PAUADP) has energized the movement to end capital punishment in our state. By mobilizing a powerful network of individuals and groups, we have implemented acomprehensive strategy designed to put at stop to all executions, death warrants and death penalty prosecutions in Pennsylvania. We are organizing an action-oriented citizens' movement which engages local and statewide power at every level and in every setting - executive, legislative, judicial, corporate, religious and community.

Challenging the Death Penalty Through Direct Action
Rooted in the direct action traditions ofthe civil-rights, women's suffrage and anti-nuclear movements, Pennsylvania Abolitionists considers it critical to build a political movement utilizing mass direct action. We seek to inspire people to exercise the full range of nonviolent direct action tactics to raise public conciousness and to call for an immediate end to the death penalty. These activities include rallies, vigils, petition gathering, teach-ins and nonviolent civil disobedience.

Building Alliances with Diverse Constituencies Among our highest priorities is working with those who suffer most at the hands of our racist, class-biased criminal "justice" system. Our grassroots strategy is designed to organize African-American, Latino, low-income and working-class communities where the wounds of violent crime and the death penalty are deepest. We also work closely with the three groups most profoundly affected by the death penalty - those sentenced to death, families of death-row prisoners, and murder victims' families.

A Statewide Organizing Vision
By mobilizing activists throughout Pennsylvania, we are cultivating a cohesive and consistent statewide voice against the death penalty. Pennsylvania Abolitionists' regional chapters establish structures, goals and tactics to meet their individual needs while carrying out the organization's mission. Other chapters address specific issues such as wrongful death penalty convictions, and constitutencies such as the religious community, family and friends of death row prisoners.

The Campaign for a Moratorium
We believe that our comprehensive statewide moratorium campaign will convince the Pennsylvania General Assembly that executions must cease while the death penalty comes under intense scrutiny. We view a moratorium as an essential, incremental step toward abolition, as a means of exposing the blatant unfairness and immorality of capital punishment. Our ambitious campaign, an unprecedented program of lobbying and direct action, is designed to bring citizen pressure to bear on legislators, demanding an immediate moratorium on executions.


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