E Pluribus Unum

When the Badger Poll asked state residents last spring whether they favored reinstating the death penalty, 56% said "yes." When an advisory referendum posed the same question on Tuesday, 56% of state voters replied "yes."

The Badger Poll went on to ask an important second question: Is the death penalty or life imprisonment with no possibility of parole a better punishment for murder? About 50% chose life imprisonment and 45% chose the death penalty.

Notably, the referendum did not ask that follow-up question.

Instead, it confirmed what polls have long suggested: When presented with no other options, a majority will say they favor the death penalty. But in Wisconsin, there is an alternative that polling routinely shows has more support: life with no chance of parole.

So until that follow-up question is put to voters, lawmakers should avoid misreading the referendum result as a mandate for the death penalty, which a wise Legislature scuttled in 1853. The last Legislature not so wisely toyed with reinstating a penalty that the world is gradually abandoning.

We have a long way to go to make our government truly representative, like universal health care which is supported by an overwhelming super-majority, and has been the case for years.