# Why/How is the Texas Governor Powerless? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [August 12, 2012, 11:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-how-is-the-texas-governor-powerless/631315 "2012-08-12T23:35:37Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 14\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![al27052](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/41988e/32.png) [@al27052](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/al27052)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2012, 3:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-how-is-the-texas-governor-powerless/631315/21 "2012-08-13T15:06:38Z")
> [@Martin\_Hyde](#): > > Bush had no desire to use the bully pulpit, he was pro-capital punishment. You almost seem to be working from the assumption that Bush somehow wasn’t explicitly pro-capital punishment, he **was explicitly pro capital punishment** and said so in every campaign he ran for as Governor of Texas and as President of the United States. By the way, both Gore and Kerry were pro-capital punishment in their campaigns against Bush, as is Barack Obama. > > Yes, capital punishment is immoral, but it’s weird people are dredging that up like it’s some deep dark secret from Bush’s past. It was a _selling point_ for many people that voted for Bush as President, and he not only did not hide it, he embraced that image. > > It’s funny though that you considered Orson Scott Card a “troll” because he told you that the Texas Governor was weak and couldn’t actually unilaterally grant clemency. When told that you were actually wrong and Card was right, you just shift the goal posts and say “he’s a troll anyway!” Seems like to me if I want factual information I’d go to Orson Scott Carrd and not you. > > However I think it very hard to make the argument Bush really is to be given credit or blame for the increased executions in Texas. The legislature (which the Texas Governor genuinely has little control over) passed legislation that streamlined the process in Texas. Texas has been very prone to sentencing people to die for a very long time (pretty much since capital punishment was restarted in the United States), it’s just that in the 90s the Texas legislature passed legislation that made it so more of those people who were sentenced could be executed faster. > > Bush basically tried to tread a bit lightly on this issue in 2000 so as not to look openly like a guy reveling in executions, but he definitely used the high rate of executions to make himself like a tough on crime, serious figure who would crack down on criminality and things of that nature. The truth is Bush deserves little of the credit for the high number of executions (and he wanted that credit in 2000), and he also doesn’t really deserve much of the blame either. He does deserve blame for using capital punishment numbers to help himself get elected, but virtually every major Presidential candidate in the last thirty years has supported capital punishment on paper just so they do not look soft on crime. I definitely agree that Bush is in no real way responsible for the increase in capital punishment in Texas. That’s obvious. However, I find it sickeningly bloodthirsty that Texans are so willing to execute so many poor/minority people in contrast with wealthier/whiter murderers, and I consider it to be verging on a a crime against humanity. Given this , I consider Bush’s _lack_ of use of his bully pulpit to rail against the unequal use of the death penalty to be 100%, unequivocally, undeniably, a tacit statement of FULL support for this unequal use of the death penalty. The other theory, yours, is that he was willing to keep quiet because it would help get him elected. Your hypothesis would be more acceptable, assuming that he actually did things that _helped_ the US during his time as president. I’m not saying that every decision he made was wrong, but I _definitely_ consider his term as POTUS a net negative. As for Orson Scott Card keeping it factual, HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA. Yeah, he gets fooled by urban legends found in chain emails all the time, and frequently has to fact-correct himself in his columns. He is the one of the laziest fact-checkers I know (particular given his high intelligence), which correlates highly with his devout Mormonism. ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2012, 3:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-how-is-the-texas-governor-powerless/631315/22 "2012-08-13T15:22:39Z")
Hmm. Under Ann Richards 34 people were executed. Under George W. Bush 152 were. Under Rick Perry over 234. Texas governors have no control over the number of executions? When was this enabling legislation passed? ---
**Author:** ![anson2995](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c77e96/32.png) [@anson2995](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/anson2995)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2012, 3:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-how-is-the-texas-governor-powerless/631315/23 "2012-08-13T15:55:19Z")
> [@CalMeacham](#): > > Hmm. Under Ann Richards 34 people were executed. Under George W. Bush 152 were. Under Rick Perry over 234. Texas governors have no control over the number of executions? When was this enabling legislation passed? 1. The law was passed due to concerns that then-Governor [Miriam Ferguson was selling pardons](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miriam_A._Ferguson). ---
**Author:** ![Martin\_Hyde](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/47e85d/32.png) [@Martin\_Hyde](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martin_Hyde)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2012, 4:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-how-is-the-texas-governor-powerless/631315/24 "2012-08-13T16:30:48Z")
> [@CalMeacham](#): > > Hmm. Under Ann Richards 34 people were executed. Under George W. Bush 152 were. Under Rick Perry over 234. Texas governors have no control over the number of executions? When was this enabling legislation passed? They have no technical legal control over who can be nominated for clemency or pardon. That is 100% the legal power of the Texas Board of Pardons and Parole, once they vote for clemency or pardon the Governor then has the option to approve or deny it. The only unilateral power the Governor has is the ability to grant a one-time, 30-day reprieve. Now, from a practical standpoint members on the Pardons and Parole board are appointed by the governor. However their terms are not synchronized with gubernatorial terms, so there isn’t even a guarantee that a governor will have board members from the same political party as him let alone of the same opinion as him on capital punishment. It’d be a lie to say the Texas Governor has absolutely no impact on capital punishment. They could vet all of their pardon board appointees and require that they be very pro-clemency, they could also apply significant political pressure on board members just by virtue of being Governor. However the whole reason the Texas system appears to be set up the way it is (as someone mentioned) is so no one body can definitively be said to have been responsible for the execution. It may have originally been set up to avoid gubernatorial corruption but it appears now it is the way it is so that no one person really has to accept responsibility for the executions. Because no one person has to accept responsibility, I think it makes it a lot easier to allow larger numbers of people to be executed. So from a strict factual perspective, the Governor of Texas has no legal authority to permanently commute a sentence or stop an execution (aside from temporarily.) Now, my personal opinion on why executions have increased so much in Texas is more a story of local culture and politics than it is anything to do with Ann Richards, George Bush, or Rick Perry. I think the Texas legislature wanted there to be more executions so they passed legislation that made executions faster to carry out. I think the Texas people like executions so they are more likely to elect prosecutors who will be “hard on crime” and campaign on being willing to seek the death penalty, and Texans are more likely to elect judges who are similarly oriented. This creates a “bottom-up” system that is pre-disposed to generating more death sentences than in other places, and then at the top of the system you have a bureaucratic board that can distribute any “responsibility” for letting the executions be carried out among its several members, and a Governor who can shrug his shoulders and say he’s powerless to act without the board’s approval. ---
**Author:** ![Martin\_Hyde](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/47e85d/32.png) [@Martin\_Hyde](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martin_Hyde)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2012, 4:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-how-is-the-texas-governor-powerless/631315/25 "2012-08-13T16:34:34Z")
> [@al27052](#): > > I definitely agree that Bush is in no real way responsible for the increase in capital punishment in Texas. That’s obvious. > > However, I find it sickeningly bloodthirsty that Texans are so willing to execute so many poor/minority people in contrast with wealthier/whiter murderers, and I consider it to be verging on a a crime against humanity. Given this , I consider Bush’s _lack_ of use of his bully pulpit to rail against the unequal use of the death penalty to be 100%, unequivocally, undeniably, a tacit statement of FULL support for this unequal use of the death penalty. > > The other theory, yours, is that he was willing to keep quiet because it would help get him elected. > > Your hypothesis would be more acceptable, assuming that he actually did things that _helped_ the US during his time as president. I’m not saying that every decision he made was wrong, but I _definitely_ consider his term as POTUS a net negative. I don’t follow your logic, you’re saying you don’t buy into my hypothesis that Bush intentionally played up his pro-capital punishment credentials in order to get votes because Bush was a bad President? Bush’s performance as President has nothing to do with his performance as a candidate or his desire to get votes. All Presidential candidates want to get votes, regardless if they end up being good or bad Presidents. > [@](#): > > As for Orson Scott Card keeping it factual, HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA. > > Yeah, he gets fooled by urban legends found in chain emails all the time, and frequently has to fact-correct himself in his columns. He is the one of the laziest fact-checkers I know (particular given his high intelligence), which correlates highly with his devout Mormonism. You seem to have a strange interest in the life of a science fiction writer that you don’t personally know. But in this case, he was correct and you were incorrect. You stated that the Texas Governor, “like any other Governor” could grant clemency or pardons. However the Texas Governor cannot, so Card’s claim that the Texas Governor is a weak Governor is factually correct (for reasons other than just capital punishment issues) and your claim that the Texas Governor can grant clemency just like any other governor is incorrect. ---
**Author:** ![al27052](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/41988e/32.png) [@al27052](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/al27052)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2012, 4:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-how-is-the-texas-governor-powerless/631315/26 "2012-08-13T16:43:55Z")
> [@Martin\_Hyde](#): > > I don’t follow your logic, you’re saying you don’t buy into my hypothesis that Bush intentionally played up his pro-capital punishment credentials in order to get votes because Bush was a bad President? Bush’s performance as President has nothing to do with his performance as a candidate or his desire to get votes. All Presidential candidates want to get votes, regardless if they end up being good or bad Presidents. My point was that, if he was keeping quiet about the death penalty inequalities to get elected, then it would be at least understandable if he had both the intention and the ability to make the country better if he got elected. > [@Martin\_Hyde](#): > > You seem to have a strange interest in the life of a science fiction writer that you don’t personally know. But in this case, he was correct and you were incorrect. You stated that the Texas Governor, “like any other Governor” could grant clemency or pardons. However the Texas Governor cannot, so Card’s claim that the Texas Governor is a weak Governor is factually correct (for reasons other than just capital punishment issues) and your claim that the Texas Governor can grant clemency just like any other governor is incorrect. Actually, I have met OSC several times, at local signings. He lives about 40 minutes from where I do, and used to do a LOT of book signings around here. He would give long talks about the state of The Ender’s Game movie, politics, etc., etc.. And he didn’t specifically claim that the Texas governor couldn’t grant pardons. He just said that the Texas governor had relatively little power. As well, my original complaint to him, about Bush, wasn’t that Bush _wasn’t_ granting pardons. My complaint was more generic. I just complained that Texas is bloodthirsty in its application of the death penalty, and that Bush presided over Texas during a time of lots of executions. My general complaint/concern was that Bush lacked compassion/caring for poor and middle-class people. His stance on the death penalty is, I feel, good evidence of that. ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2012, 4:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-how-is-the-texas-governor-powerless/631315/27 "2012-08-13T16:57:44Z")
> [@anson2995](#): > > 1. > > The law was passed due to concerns that then-Governor [Miriam Ferguson was selling pardons](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miriam_A._Ferguson). Then you can’t really say it’s responsible for Bush’s and Perry’s escalating numbers of executions. ---
**Author:** ![suranyi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e36b37/32.png) [@suranyi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/suranyi)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2012, 5:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-how-is-the-texas-governor-powerless/631315/28 "2012-08-13T17:09:44Z")
> [@t-bonham@scc.net](#): > > no. In most stqtes, the heads of all those executive agencies & commissions are appointed by the Governor. Usually, the terms of the existing ones expire at inauguration time, so the new governor can appoint all new people of his own views/party. So that gives him a lot of control over all the executive branch that actually does the work of state government. > > (Often, these appointment, at least the high level ones, have to be confirmed by the State Senate. But it’s rare that they refuse to confirm a Governor’s appointee, and usually considered a slap to the Governor if they do that.) Interesting. California has a similar system as Texas. All the top state officers are individually elected by the voters. ---
**Author:** ![Speak\_to\_me\_Maddie](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/58956e/32.png) [@Speak\_to\_me\_Maddie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Speak_to_me_Maddie)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2012, 5:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-how-is-the-texas-governor-powerless/631315/29 "2012-08-13T17:15:04Z")
> [@CalMeacham](#): > > Then you can’t really say it’s responsible for Bush’s and Perry’s escalating numbers of executions. Ya’ll are referring to two different laws. The 1936 law took the power over executions (and commutations) out of the governor’s hands. A law passed in 1995 dramatically sped up the process for death row appeals, which resulted in a huge increase in executions staring around 1997 after that law passed appeals. ---
**Author:** ![Martin\_Hyde](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/47e85d/32.png) [@Martin\_Hyde](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martin_Hyde)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2012, 5:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-how-is-the-texas-governor-powerless/631315/30 "2012-08-13T17:26:30Z")
> [@CalMeacham](#): > > Then you can’t really say it’s responsible for Bush’s and Perry’s escalating numbers of executions. I don’t think anyone is saying the _lack_ of power by the Texas Governor to unilaterally grant clemency is why Texas has a high rate of executions. Only that because of that significant limitation on the power of the Governor it is hard to actually blame the Governor. Death sentences are primarily controlled by prosecutors and judges, neither group reports to the Texas Governor. In 1995 the Texas legislature passed a law that expedited the appeals process in capital cases, and that is probably the only thing at a State government level that explicitly can be said to contribute to the high number of executions. The “Texas Moratorium Network PAC” which is a Texas PAC opposed to the death penalty primarily blames Texas DAs for the death penalty, specifically Texas DAs in a few specific counties. Since Gregg v. Georgia over 130 executions have been carried out from cases out of Harris County, and over 100 Texas counties have never sent a person to death row since Gregg v. Georgia. That same advocacy group also points to Texas having popularly elected appellate judges (who are the judges who review the automatic appeals every death sentence gets), and the fact that Texas is in the 5th Circuit (more conservative) for Federal appeals are other significant factors. The Texas governor is barely even involved in legislation activity (that being more the purview of the Lt. Governor) let alone the criminal justice system. ---
**Author:** ![Martin\_Hyde](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/47e85d/32.png) [@Martin\_Hyde](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Martin_Hyde)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2012, 5:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-how-is-the-texas-governor-powerless/631315/31 "2012-08-13T17:32:16Z")
> [@suranyi](#): > > Interesting. California has a similar system as Texas. All the top state officers are individually elected by the voters. Divided executive is fairly common in State government, I actually don’t know if any state has all executive branch officers appointed by the governor. Most have an elected AG and Secretary of State, for example. Only 5 States have a gubernatorial appointee AG, 35 States elect State Secretary of State. I don’t think that in general the number of statewide elected offices is why the Texas Governor is weak, the Texas Governor is primarily weak because the Texas Lieutenant Governor is extremely powerful relative to Lieutenant Governors in almost every other State. The Texas Lt. Governor has actual legislative day-to-day powers that he actually uses, and is involved in the legislation and budgeting process. In most States the Governor behaves more like the President, coming up with a budget plan that the legislature either approves or modifies significantly and then approves. That’s really why the Texas Governor is weak generally, because unlike most Governors the Texas Governor has almost no actual legislative power and very little “practical” legislative power. If you look at the U.S. Constitution the President would be a lot weaker if Congress basically was fully assertive of its powers, but because Congress is typically divided between parties and various intra-party factions, and because a lot of day-to-day governing is handled by executive agencies that follow Presidential orders the U.S. President is de facto a lot more powerful than he is on paper. In Texas basically none of that is the case so the Texas Governor is both technically and practically weak. He’s not weak because he can’t grant clemency, as that’s a minor power in any case, but the fact that he can’t grant unilateral clemency is just another example of the genuine weakness of the Texas Governor. ---
**Author:** ![anson2995](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c77e96/32.png) [@anson2995](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/anson2995)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2012, 6:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-how-is-the-texas-governor-powerless/631315/32 "2012-08-13T18:22:35Z")
> [@CalMeacham](#): > > Then you can’t really say it’s responsible for Bush’s and Perry’s escalating numbers of executions. You’re right, and I didn’t. As others have pointed out, the streamlined appeal process probably accounts for the rising numbers since 1997. That happened while Bush was Governor, and Perry is the only other Governor to serve since then. It’s probably more instructive to look at executions per year, rather than by Governor, given that Perry, for example, as served three times longer than Richards. ---
**Author:** ![robert\_columbia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e79b87/32.png) [@robert\_columbia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/robert_columbia)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2012, 6:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-how-is-the-texas-governor-powerless/631315/33 "2012-08-13T18:27:34Z")
But the most important thing is, Does he _admit_ that he is powerless? ---
**Author:** ![al27052](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/41988e/32.png) [@al27052](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/al27052)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2012, 6:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-how-is-the-texas-governor-powerless/631315/34 "2012-08-13T18:43:21Z")
> [@robert\_columbia](#): > > But the most important thing is, > > Does he _admit_ that he is powerless? ROFL Yes, but only when he/she is allowed to simultaneously say that his powerlessness is evidence of the awesomeness and general superiority of Texas. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-how-is-the-texas-governor-powerless/631315.md?page=1)