For Gov. Jay Nixon, one is the loneliest number.

As the days are marked off the calendar one by one, signaling an end to 2013, Nixon, for now at least, ends the year with the same number of executive acts of mercy with which he started the year.

One.

Only once during his five years as governor has he used the most powerful justice tool available to a state's chief executive, the power of clemency. In 2011, the governor spared the life of convicted murderer Richard Clay, commuting his death sentence to life in prison. The governor, a former attorney general, offered no explanation for this single act of mercy.

The power of clemency can change lives. It can be merciful and just.

Witness President Barack Obama's decision last Thursday to issue 13 pardons, and commute eight sentences of men and women who had been caught up in the overreaction to the crack epidemic of the 1980s. Thousands of mostly poor, African-American crack users were given disproportionatley long sentences compared to those who used powder cocaine, the drug of choice for wealthier drug users.

Obama, a Democrat, has used his power of clemency sparingly compared to other presidents. Still, he now has issued 52 pardons. By comparison, President Ronald Reagan, a Republican, issued 393 pardons in his two terms.

Similarly, Nixon's reluctance to grant clemency is out of whack with his predecessors, be they Democrats like him, or Republicans.

Ironically, the governor to use the pardon pen the most in recent years was Gov. Roger Wilson, who was in office less than a year but issued 45 pardons or commutations. In his one term, Gov. Matt Blunt, a Republican, issued 16 pardons or commutations. Fellow Republican Gov. John Ashcroft issued 30 in his two terms. Democrats Bob Holden and Mel Carnahan issued 37 and 32 pardons or commutations, respectively.

Nixon, it seems, shows no mercy.

Not for Patty Prewitt, the 62-year-old grandmother in jail for killing her husband, who has been singled out by numerous elected officials, Democrats and Republicans alike, along with judges and corrections advocates as a perfect candidate for pardon.

Not for Jeffrey Mizanskey, the man profiled by the Riverfront Times and Post-Dispatch columnist Bill McClellan. Mizanskey is doing a life sentence for a marijuana charge.

Not for any of the young black men and women in prisons, who, like the people who had their sentences commuted last week by Obama, have served far longer time in jail than they deserved because of sentencing guidelines that even lawmakers have realized were not just, but just plain wrong.

No, this holiday season is shaping up to be like the other four that Nixon has spent in the Governor's Mansion. To think that there's no one among the 30,000 inmates in Missouri's prisons (at $22,350 a year each) who deserves a break is not just unrealistic, but cruel.

Former Maryland Gov. Bob Ehrlich, a Republican, writes this about using the gubernatorial power of clemency: "Using it wisely and regularly does justice, changes lives and fulfills a constitutional duty."

Nixon is derelict in that constitutional duty.

REPRINTED FROM THE ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH