Search

The Capital Jury Project (CJP) was started in 1991 under the direction of principal investigation, William J. Bowers. The project was funded by an NSF grant to conduct surveys of juror who participated in capital trials. There are three phases to the project.

The Correctional Association of New York Records includes records from the Board of Directors, annual reports, prison visit files, Narcotics Committee files, program and bureau files, project files, subject files, and publications. The only records of the organization available from the nineteenth century are the annual reports, which have been microfilmed and are available in the University Library.

The David Von Drehle Papers contain information on the death penalty, primarily in Florida. Von Drehle compiled the materials while researching his 1995 book Among the Lowest of the Dead: Inside Death Row.

This collection is predominantly composed of Ernest van den Haag's publications from 1950-2000, including articles in published form, drafts, and related correspondence.

For over six decades, Eugene G. Wanger created or collected the materials about capital punishment that comprise the Eugene G. Wanger and Marilyn M. Wanger Death Penalty Collection. The collection includes a wide range of materials on the death penalty documenting its history, efforts to abolish or reinstate the practice, its psychological impact, compatibility on religious, moral or ethical grounds, and its operation.

Hugo A. Bedau (Ph.D., Harvard, 1961) was a commentator, scholar, and activist for the abolition of capital punishment. He was a prominent spokesperson in the abolitionist movement and well-known for his scholarship and writing concerning the death penalty and the challenge to separate logical arguments from moral arguments.

The Illinois Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty (ICADP) formed in 1976 as the Illinois Coalition Against the Death Penalty by Mary Alice Rankin and other activist groups and organizations to try to prevent passage of capital punishment legislation in Illinois. After the state adopted the death penalty in 1977, ICADP expanded its grassroots legislative, education, and communication activities to try to inform the public about flaws and injustices in the Illinois capital punishment system and promote humane alternatives to the death penalty.

The Leigh Bienen Papers include the records of the New Jersey Proportionality Review Project, the Illinois Capital Punishment Reform Study Commission, and the academic research papers of legal scholar Leigh Bienen. The New Jersey records contain material from New Jersey Public Defender Homicide Study directed by Bienen in the mid-1980s. The collection also includes the records from Bienen's involvement with the New Jersey Proportionality Review Project headed by Special Master David C. Baldus. Also present is material from Leigh Bienen's tenure on the Illinois Capital Punishment Reform Study Commission which resulted in the abolition of the death penalty in that state in 2011. Finally the collection contains Leigh Bienen's scholarly research material during her career teaching at both Princeton University and Northwestern University. Her research focused on proportionality review, the death penalty's monetary costs, and the role of prosecutor discretion.

The Herrera Collection contain materials associated with the life and trial of Leonel Herrera, as well as materials included in the book , written by Leonel Herrera's sister, Norma Herrera Ellis.

This collection documents the death penalty abolitionist work of Marie McFadden Deans. A smaller amount of personal materials, such as Deans' poetry and writing, also is included.