 opinion polls show that over 80 percent of the country want capital punishment restored" (785 Parl. Deb. House of Commons, 1229).
Furthermore, an analysis of these transcripts provided insight into the political rhetoric of British intellectual elitism. During the floor debates in 1969 concerning the Murder Act, multiple Members of Parliament (MPs) used elitist rhetoric to encourage officials to separate themselves from the emotions of the masses in the decision-making process. For example, on December 15, 1969, MP Hogg gave a passionate speech on the floor of the House of Commons in which he called on MPs to vote in accordance with their conscience and the social science research presented to the assembly.
"It is precisely because we regard the question of the death penalty as a matter for the individual conscience and on which the House of Commons may very well prove itself to be out of tune with a considerable body of public opinion, that we felt, and we think now, that when a decision is reached, it should be reached in a way to ensure that it has the maximum moral authority behind it." (793 Parl. Deb. House of Commons, 942)
MP Hogg, a Conservative Member of Parliament, went on to suggest that the government was wise in attempting to "divorce this subject from the emotional atmosphere of an election year" (793 Parl. Deb. House of Commons, 943). In subsequent days of debate, MPs from the Labour and Conservative Party echoed this sentiment. On the same day, MP Winnick suggested that the determination of some moral issues is best left to educated politicians.
"Unfortunately, some hon. Members opposite want to make hanging an election issue. We are told that public opinion is in favor of hanging. That has been indicated in the opinion polls. If we (British Parliament) had listened to public opinion, slavery and public executions would not have been abolished in our country. It is sometimes right for the House to take the lead, and it would be right to do so tomorrow night." (793 Parl. Deb. House of Commons, 973)
It is important to note here that even the idea of “making hanging an election issue” would seem foreign to American citizens who expect their political leaders to vote alongside the majority of constituents on all issues. Indeed, many speeches on the floor referred directly to the concept of Burkean trusteeship, a political theory of representation that “allows elected representatives to deny their constituents on matters of high principle" (Hammel 2011, 203).
One of the most surprising findings in the documentary analysis was that even the British public celebrated Parliament's detachment from popular opinion. For example, in The Times in February 1965, R.A. Bickford Smith wrote in a Letter to the Editor, "is an appeal to public opinion valid in this matter of social advance? I would suggest that on occasion public opinion should be led rather than be allowed to do the leading" (Bickford Smith 1965). Several other Letters to the Editor were published in The Times from 1965 to 1969 that supported the sentiment of Bickford Smith. The discourse analysis suggests that this type of Burkean trusteeship was accepted by at least some of the British public as a legitimate approach to political representation on the issue of death penalty abolition.
2. The United States: A Failed Moratorium
Curiously, when the British Parliament approved the Murder Act of 1965 against the will of 80 percent of their constituents, American support for the death penalty was at an all-time low. In 1966, a Harris Survey indicated that only 42 percent of Americans supported the death penalty (Bohm 2003, 31). In fact, Gallup polling of death penalty support in the United States from the 1930s onward has revealed a v-shape progression with the 1960s as the nadir (Gallup 2012). The American government launched into its own experimental moratorium in 1972 when the Supreme Court ruling in Furman v. Georgia temporarily halted executions for four years. The justices' decision to evaluate capital punishment in Furman was heavily influenced by public