To Pardon Or Not To Pardon -- A Big Quandary For Mitt Romney

Former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney is very proud of the fact that he denied every request for a pardon or commutation while he was the governor for four years. This is something he loves pointing out during his campaign across the nation.

He says his refusal for pardons stemmed from the fact that he did not want overturn the rulings by a jury.

Now he claims if he becomes the president, pardons is something, he willing to look into.

While Romney was the governor for four years, he received 100 requests for commutations and 72 for pardons. Romney has the distinction of denying them all.

The reason that Romney as has given for denying pardons is something that critics are not willing to accept. They have the opinion that the president and governors have the power for pardon which they are suppose to exercise in cases where they find out that a person convicted for a past crime has made efforts to change his life for the better.

There are many people in Massachusetts were convicted for a crime but managed to turn around their. They were seeking pardon from Romney while he was the governor, but were denied.

One such person is Anthony Circosta, a decorated Iraq war veteran. He was a 13 year old boy when he was convicted for assault for shooting another boy in the arm with a BB gun. In 2005, he asked for a pardon so that he could become a police officer but his request was denied. This has happened to him twice.

The strangest part is that it was Romney, himself, who approved the guidelines for pardons when he became the governor. One of the guidelines states that a person convicted for a crime should demonstrate good citizenship by showing his ability to lead a responsible and productive life for a sizeable period of time after the conviction.

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