More News

ANNAPOLIS — Gov. Martin O'Malley used his third State of the State address Thursday to call on the General Assembly to abolish the death penalty and to make college education more affordable.

The death penalty has become a central issue of policy debate in the legislature. Efforts to repeal capital punishment have been stymied in the Senate Judicial Proceedings Committee, where measures have failed by a single vote.

"Decent people can disagree on this issue, but as your governor, I ask that you give this important moral question of repeal of the death penalty a fair up-or-down vote in both houses of this legislature," O'Malley's said.

He delivered the speech in the House of Delegates chamber, crowded also with senators and other dignitaries. Included in the audience was Benjamin R. Civiletti, who chaired a 23-member panel that called for the abolition of Maryland's death penalty.

He called a college education an investment in the future.

"This is about doing for our generation what the GI Bill did for my father's generation," O'Malley said.

Since taking office, O'Malley's budgets have included extra funding for state-supported universities to freeze tuition.

The speech included two excerpts from letters O'Malley received from residents across the state. One was a woman from Allegany County worried that the cost of electricity would make her homeless. Another was a 53-year-old from Baltimore County whose finances were hit so hard that he might not be able to complete the final six months of his college education.

O'Malley's speech asked the legislature to provide $132 million in energy assistance for 125,000 Marylanders, to expand health care and to offer unemployment benefits to part-time workers.

He is seeking to guarantee the prevailing wage for 118 more state-sponsored projects.

And, he said he is seeking a crackdown on businesses that classify employees as independent contractors to skirt unemployment insurance costs.