David Elliot represents the National Coalition Against the Death Penalty

Wisconsin voters this November will be asked their opinion on whether the death penalty should be reinstated. Bringing back capitol punishment after a 153-year hiatus makes about as much sense as driving down I-94 in reverse.You see, even as Wisconsin is considering a nonbinding referendum on the issue, states around the country are backing away from the death penalty. The number of executions is down, public support is down and the number of death sentences sought by prosecutors and handed down by juries has dropped sharply over the past decade.In recent years, a number of states have debated placing a moratorium on executions or doing away with the death penalty altogether. These states include “blue” states like New York and New Jersey as well as “red” states like Montana and North Carolina.

The truth, as both Democrats and Republicans are coming to realize, is that capital punishment is a failed social experiment. It has not made us more safe. It makes egregious errors. And its cost is increasingly more than we can bear.

If the death penalty truly served as a deterrent, it has been joked, then Texas, with its nearly 400 executions over the past 30 years, would be nirvana crisscrossed with interstate highways.

Actually, the murder rate in death penalty states is significantly higher than the murder rate in non-death penalty states, according to the FBI Uniform Crime Reports. States with the death penalty reported 5.2 murders per 100,000 population, compared with a rate of 2.9 murders per 100,000 population in non-death penalty states. Texas’ rate of 6.2 murders per 100,000 population is nearly double Wisconsin’s rate of 3.2 murders per 100,000 population.

The death penalty also is prone to error. Since 1976, 123 people have walked off of death row – and lived to tell their tale – after evidence emerged of their innocence. Recently, some of the nation’s leading newspapers have reported that several people executed years ago may well have been innocent – Larry Griffin in Missouri and Ruben Cantu, Carlos De Luna and Cameron Todd Willingham, each of Texas.

If we send people away for lengthy prison terms and later learn that they are innocent, we can move to correct the error. But if we execute them and later find out they are innocent, there is no remedy. The death penalty is not like a Green Bay Packers game – there’s no instant replay and there are no do-overs.

Finally, the enormous cost of the death penalty is something that Wisconsin taxpayers should not be asked to bear. In New Jersey, where state leaders are considering abolishing the death penalty, a report found that since the death penalty was reinstated in 1992, it has cost $253 million above and beyond the cost of life without parole. And the most shocking thing about that figure is that New Jersey has yet to execute anyone.

And the thing about cost is this: tax dollars are not a limitless resource. The millions and millions of dollars that Wisconsin taxpayers would be asked to spend on a death penalty has to come from some where. It would come from our schools. Or from our hospitals. Or from programs to protect the environment. Or perhaps it would come from public safety programs – more money to pay police officers or efforts aimed at helping crime victims or cutting down on alcohol and drug abuse or eradicating gang violence.

Maybe instead of spending millions on a death penalty that doesn’t serve as a deterrent and is error prone, we could put it to another use. Like making that drive across I-94 more safe.

Wisconsin should just say no to the death penalty.