Hawai'i abolished capital punishment a half-century ago and has never wavered in its policy.

Eleven other states have taken a stand against the death penalty. It's a position that the federal government seems determined to overturn.

Most recently, that determination has been apparent in the prosecution of the double murder committed at Pali Municipal Golf Course in 2004. Officials of the federal Department of Justice are considering seeking the death penalty in that shooting case.

Prosecutors locally charged the three defendants with first-degree murder, which carries a mandatory life term without parole. That's the state's harshest penalty — but apparently it's not harsh enough for the feds.

The U.S. Attorney's Office in Honolulu got the defendants indicted on racketeering charges, allegations that the murders and attempted murder were carried out as part of an illegal gambling business. That puts the case within federal jurisdiction, and the death penalty becomes a possibility.

It's not the first time the feds have sought control of murder cases, of course, and it's not been only under the Bush administration. In 1994, Congress expanded the types of murder that could be prosecuted as capital cases and in 1999, then-Attorney General Janet Reno initially sought the death penalty in the Hawai'i murder case against Richard Lee Tuck Chong, dropping that demand in a later plea agreement.

But the Justice Department seems to have put pedal to the metal in its pursuit of death sentences. The campaign was begun by former Attorney General John Ashcroft and continued under his embattled successor, Alberto Gonzales. Reluctance to seek the death penalty may have factored into some of the controversial firings of U.S. attorneys.

There are murder cases that deserve the harshest penalty under state law. But the state decided long ago that capital punishment does not deter capital crime, and putting criminals to death reduces our society to the same level as murderers.

The federal government should not persist in this end run on the states' policies. Imposing the death penalty in this case due to racketeering ties is a perversion of justice.

Indeed, different standards have been applied in murder cases of varying degrees, the Byran Uyesugi massacre at the Xerox offices, for example.

The upheaval over the U.S. attorneys' firings may produce a side benefit: The feds may not see this as an opportune moment to impose its will on a non-death-penalty state. We can hope for that, at least.