By Kevin Cooper
(Written to be read at a vigil at San Quentin on the night of the execution of Michael Morales.
Morales's execution was stayed that night for lack of a humane means of execution.
It remains stayed to this day (November 18, 2025), and there have been no executions since.)
I once read that California is no longer a majority white state, that it's about 50-50, whites and minorities. It is said to be one of the most diverse states in this country, and maybe in the entire world. Diversity has always allowed this state to stand out among just about all other states, and some other countries.
But the government only shows its true feelings about diversity when it comes to who gets the death penalty and who doesn't.
The state's true colors have been shown during the last three legal murders—those of Stan Tookie Williams, Donald Beardslee, and Clarence Ray Allen—and the one that will occur tonight. One Black man, one white man, one Native American man, and now one Latino man, Michael Morales. Not even the staff that works for the governor of this diverse state is this diverse, at least not racially or culturally.
Yet neither he nor they see any problem with the very real and historical fact that it is still the rich and the powerful, who are still headed overwhelmingly by white men, who are still deciding who lives and who dies.
The skin I'm in won't allow me to deny this fact, nor will the history of the people whose skin I have inherited allow for me to forget.
I know that some of you may be asking: What does he mean by the skin he's in? Well, let me briefly explain. The skin I am in refers to my experience in this life as a poor Black man, and that of my ancestors whose skin color I inherited. It also represents what most poor people go through in this world, but especially those who find themselves in my present situation: fighting for my life on death row.
On February 9th, 2004, I found myself in the same situation that Michael Morales is in tonight, being put through what he and all people who have been executed by this state have gone through.
Skin that looks just like mine has been the first choice of certain people in this world and country to commit every type of crime of violence against. Legal as in the death penalty, or illegal as in lynching. The skin I'm in has experienced more crimes against humanity than most people's, just because it what it is: Black.
In struggle from death row at San Quentin Prison,
Kevin Cooper