Capital punishment in the United States

File:Usa-executions.svg

The first recorded death sentence in the British North American colonies was carried out in 1608 on Captain George Kendall,{{cite web |author= |year=2010 |title=Part I: History of the Death Penalty, Death Penalty Information Center |url=http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org/part-i-history-death-penalty |access-date=April 12, 2011 |website=Death Penalty Information Center}} who was executed by firing squad{{cite web |author=Waksman |first=David |title=Is there a Death Penalty in America? |url=http://lawenforcementtoday.com/tag/captain-george-kendall/ |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131230232544/http://lawenforcementtoday.com/tag/captain-george-kendall/ |archive-date=December 30, 2013 |access-date=December 28, 2013}} at the Jamestown colony for spying on behalf of the Spanish government.{{cite web |url=http://www.antideathpenalty.org/history.html |title=History of the Death Penalty in America |publisher=Antideathpenalty.org |access-date=December 1, 2011 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20111116172949/http://www.antideathpenalty.org/history.html |archive-date=November 16, 2011 |url-status=dead }} Executions in colonial America were also carried out by hanging. The hangman's noose was one of the various punishments the Puritans of the Massachusetts Bay Colony applied to enforce religious and intellectual conformity on the whole community.{{cite journal |last1=Merrill |first1=Louis Taylor |title=The Puritan Policeman |journal=American Sociological Review |publisher=American Sociological Association |date=1945 |volume=10 |issue=6 |pages=766–776 |doi=10.2307/2085847 |jstor=2085847 |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/2085847 |issn = 0003-1224 |url-access=subscription }}

The Bill of Rights adopted in 1789 included the Eighth Amendment which prohibited cruel and unusual punishment. The Fifth Amendment was drafted with language implying a possible use of the death penalty, requiring a grand jury indictment for "capital crime" and a due process of law for deprivation of "life" by the government.{{cite web |title= BAZE v. REES (No. 07-5439) [April 16, 2008] Justice Scalia, with whom Justice Thomas joins, concurring in the judgment |url= https://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/07-5439.ZC2.html|publisher= law.cornell.edu |access-date= April 7, 2016}} The Fourteenth Amendment adopted in 1868 also requires a due process of law for deprivation of life by any states.[https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/due_process due process] Retrieved 15 May 2024 The federal death penalty was restricted to a small category of crimes.{{cite journal|last=Freedman|first=Hannah|title=The Modern Federal Death Penalty: A Cruel and Unusual Penalty|url=https://live-cornell-law-review.pantheonsite.io/wp-content/uploads/2023/01/Freedman-final.pdf|journal=Cornell Law Review|volume=107|access-date=28 December 2024}}{{rp|p=1696}} Founders saw the ultimate penalty as a means of protecting sovereign interests.{{Cite web|url=https://www.cornelllawreview.org/2022/09/01/the-modern-federal-death-penalty-a-cruel-and-unusual-penalty/|title=The Modern Federal Death Penalty: A Cruel and Unusual Penalty|author=|date=1 September 2022|publisher=Cornell Law Review|access-date=28 December 2024}} Death penalty was carried out according to local customs.{{rp|p=1696}}

The Espy file,{{cite web |url=http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org/article.php?scid=8&did=269 |title=Espy file |publisher=Deathpenaltyinfo.org |access-date=December 1, 2011 |archive-date=September 5, 2008 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080905090951/http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org/article.php?scid=8&did=269 |url-status=dead }} compiled by M. Watt Espy and John Ortiz Smykla, lists 15,269 people executed in the United States and its predecessor colonies between 1608 and 1991. From 1930 to 2002, there were 4,661 executions in the United States; about two-thirds of them in the first 20 years.[http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/cp.htm Department of Justice] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20091211212953/http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/cp.htm |date=December 11, 2009 }} of the United States of America Additionally, the United States Army executed 135 soldiers between 1916 and 1961 (the most recent).{{cite web |url=http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org/article.php?did=180 |title=The U.S. Military Death Penalty |publisher=Deathpenaltyinfo.org |access-date=December 1, 2011 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080522175848/http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org/article.php?did=180 |archive-date=May 22, 2008 }}John A. Bennett{{cite web |url=http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org/article.php?scid=32&did=988 |title=Executions in the Military |publisher=Deathpenaltyinfo.org |access-date=December 1, 2011 |archive-date=August 8, 2008 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080808084901/http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org/article.php?scid=32&did=988 |url-status=dead }}

{{more citations needed | section | date = October 2021}}

Three states abolished the death penalty for murder during the 19th century: Michigan (which only executed 1 prisoner and is the first government in the English-speaking world to abolish capital punishment){{cite web |title=Michigan Legal Milestones: 41. First to Abolish the Death Penalty |url=https://www.michbar.org/programs/milestone/milestones_firsttoabolish |website=www.michbar.org |access-date=August 30, 2022}} in 1847, Wisconsin in 1853, and Maine in 1887. Rhode Island is also a state with a long abolitionist background, having repealed the death penalty in 1852, though it was available for murder committed by a prisoner between 1872 and 1984.

Other states which abolished the death penalty for murder before Gregg v. Georgia include Minnesota in 1911, Vermont in 1964, Iowa and West Virginia in 1965, and North Dakota in 1973. Hawaii abolished the death penalty in 1948 and Alaska in 1957, both before their statehood. Puerto Rico repealed it in 1929 and the District of Columbia in 1981. Arizona and Oregon abolished the death penalty by popular vote in 1916 and 1964 respectively, but both reinstated it, again by popular vote, some years later; Arizona reinstated the death penalty in 1918 and Oregon in 1978. In Oregon, the measure reinstating the death penalty was overturned by the Oregon Supreme Court in 1981, but Oregon voters again reinstated the death penalty in 1984.{{cite web|url=https://ballotpedia.org/Death_penalty_on_the_ballot|title= Death penalty on the ballot |publisher= ballotpedia.org |access-date=April 6, 2016}} Puerto Rico and Michigan are the only two U.S. jurisdictions to have explicitly prohibited capital punishment in their constitutions: in 1952 and 1964, respectively.[https://www.echoeducation.com.au/samples/2021deathpenalty/background.php Early abolition movement] Retrieved 15 May 2024

Capital punishment was used by 6 of 50 states in 2022. They were Alabama, Arizona, Mississippi, Missouri, Oklahoma and Texas.{{cite news|first=Corine|last=Lesnes|title=Peine de mort : aux Etats-Unis, l'année des exécutions " bâclées "|url=https://www.lemonde.fr/international/article/2023/01/02/peine-de-mort-aux-etats-unis-l-annee-des-executions-baclees_6156282_3210.html|language=fr|work=Le Monde|date=January 2, 2023 }} Government executions, as reported by Amnesty International, took place in 20 of the world's 195 countries. The Federal government of the United States, which had not executed a prisoner since 2003, did so in 2020, in an effort led by President Donald Trump and Attorney General William Barr.

Executions for various crimes, especially murder and rape, occurred from the creation of the United States up to the early 1960s. Until then, "save for a few mavericks, no one gave any credence to the possibility of ending the death penalty by judicial interpretation of constitutional law", according to abolitionist Hugo Bedau.{{Cite book |last=Bedau |first=Hugo Adam |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=L_8VAQAAIAAJ |title=The Courts, the Constitution, and Capital Punishment |date=1977 |publisher=Lexington Books |isbn=978-0-669-01290-3 |pages=118 |language=en}}

The possibility of challenging the constitutionality of the death penalty became progressively more realistic after the Supreme Court of the United States decided on Trop v. Dulles in 1958. The Supreme Court declared explicitly, for the first time, that the Eighth Amendment's cruel and unusual punishment clause must draw its meaning from the "evolving standards of decency that mark the progress of a maturing society", rather than from its original meaning. Also in the 1932 case Powell v. Alabama, the court made the first step of what would later be called "death is different" jurisprudence, when it held that any indigent defendant was entitled to a court-appointed attorney in capital cases – a right that was only later extended to non-capital defendants in 1963, with Gideon v. Wainwright.

{{Further|Furman v. Georgia}}In Furman v. Georgia, the U.S. Supreme Court considered a group of consolidated cases. The lead case involved an individual convicted under Georgia's death penalty statute, which featured a "unitary trial" procedure in which the jury was asked to return a verdict of guilt or innocence and, simultaneously, determine whether the defendant would be punished by death or life imprisonment. The last pre-Furman execution was that of Luis Monge on June 2, 1967.

In a 5–4 decision, the Supreme Court struck down the impositions of the death penalty in each of the consolidated cases as unconstitutional in violation of the Eighth and Fourteenth Amendments of the United States Constitution. The Supreme Court has never ruled the death penalty to be per se unconstitutional. The five justices in the majority did not produce a common opinion or rationale for their decision, however, and agreed only on a short statement announcing the result. The narrowest opinions, those of Byron White and Potter Stewart, expressed generalized concerns about the inconsistent application of the death penalty across a variety of cases, but did not exclude the possibility of a constitutional death penalty law. Stewart and William O. Douglas worried explicitly about racial discrimination in enforcement of the death penalty. Thurgood Marshall and William J. Brennan Jr. expressed the opinion that the death penalty was proscribed absolutely by the Eighth Amendment as cruel and unusual punishment. This decision was reached by the suspicion that many states, particularly in the South, were using capital punishment as a form of legal lynching of African-American males, inasmuch as almost all executions for non-homicidal rape in the Southern states involved a black perpetrator, and this suspicion was fueled by cases such as the Martinsville Seven, when seven African-American men were executed by Virginia in 1951 for the gang rape of a white woman.[https://hls.harvard.edu/today/the-end-of-the-death-penalty/ History of a ‘remarkable intervention’] Retrieved 16 May 2024

The Furman decision caused all death sentences pending at the time to be reduced to life imprisonment, and was described by scholars as a "legal bombshell". The next day, columnist Barry Schweid wrote that it was "unlikely" that the death penalty could exist anymore in the United States.{{Cite news |last=Schweid |first=Barry |author-link=Barry Schweid |date=June 30, 1972 |title=New laws unlikely on death penalty |pages=4 |work=The Free Lance-Star |url=https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=pAoQAAAAIBAJ&sjid=2YoDAAAAIBAJ&pg=3786,38609&hl=en |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230202061334/http://news.google.com/newspapers?id=pAoQAAAAIBAJ&sjid=2YoDAAAAIBAJ&pg=3786,38609&hl=en |archive-date=February 2, 2023}}

{{Further|Gregg v. Georgia|Capital punishment in Georgia (U.S. state)}}

File:Panorama of United States Supreme Court Building at Dusk.jpg, Washington, D.C.]]

Instead of abandoning capital punishment, 37 states enacted new death penalty statutes that attempted to address the concerns of White and Stewart in Furman. Some states responded by enacting mandatory death penalty statutes which prescribed a sentence of death for anyone convicted of certain forms of murder. White had hinted that such a scheme would meet his constitutional concerns in his Furman opinion. Other states adopted "bifurcated" trial and sentencing procedures, with various procedural limitations on the jury's ability to pronounce a death sentence designed to limit juror discretion.Gregg v. Georgia, {{ussc|428|153|1976}}

On July 2, 1976, the U.S. Supreme Court decided Gregg v. Georgia and upheld 7–2 a Georgia procedure in which the trial of capital crimes was bifurcated into guilt-innocence and sentencing phases. At the first proceeding, the jury decides the defendant's guilt; if the defendant is innocent or otherwise not convicted of first-degree murder, the death penalty will not be imposed. At the second hearing, the jury determines whether certain statutory aggravating factors exist, whether any mitigating factors exist, and, in many jurisdictions, weigh the aggravating and mitigating factors in assessing the ultimate penalty – either death or life in prison, either with or without parole. The same day, in Woodson v. North CarolinaWoodson v. North Carolina, {{ussc|428|280|1976}} and Roberts v. Louisiana,Roberts v. Louisiana, {{ussc|428|325|1976}}, {{ussc|431|633|1977}} the court struck down 5–4 statutes providing a mandatory death sentence.

Executions resumed on January 17, 1977, when Gary Gilmore went before a firing squad in Utah. Although hundreds of individuals were sentenced to death in the United States during the 1970s and early 1980s, only ten people besides Gilmore (who had waived all of his appeal rights) were executed prior to 1984.

Following the decision, the use of capital punishment in the United States soared.{{Cite journal|last1=Steiker|first1=Carol S.|last2=Steiker|first2=Jordan M.|date=January 13, 2020|title=The Rise, Fall, and Afterlife of the Death Penalty in the United States|journal=Annual Review of Criminology|language=en|volume=3|issue=1|pages=299–315|doi=10.1146/annurev-criminol-011518-024721|issn=2572-4568|doi-access=free}} This was in contrast to trends in other parts of advanced industrial democracies where the use of capital punishment declined or was prohibited. Members of the Council of Europe comply with the European Convention of Human Rights which prohibits capital punishment. The last execution in the UK took place in 1964,{{Cite web |title=The last British death sentence, 50 years ago today |url=https://www.amnesty.org.uk/fifty-50-years-death-penalty-britain-uk |access-date=May 13, 2023 |website=www.amnesty.org.uk}} and in 1977 in France.

{{See also|Felony murder and the death penalty in the United States}}

In 1977, the Supreme Court's Coker v. Georgia decision barred the death penalty for rape of an adult woman. Previously, the death penalty for rape of an adult had been gradually phased out in the United States, and at the time of the decision, Georgia and the Federal government were the only two jurisdictions to still retain the death penalty for this offense.

In the 1980 case Godfrey v. Georgia, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that murder can be punished by death only if it involves a narrow and precise aggravating factor.{{cite web |title= Godfrey v. Georgia |url= https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/446/420/ |publisher= supreme.justia.com |access-date=March 24, 2016}}

The Supreme Court has placed two major restrictions on the use of the death penalty. First, the case of Atkins v. Virginia, decided on June 20, 2002,{{cite web|url=http://supct.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/00-8452.ZO.html|title=DARYL RENARD ATKINS, PETITIONER v. VIRGINIA|access-date=August 6, 2006|date=June 20, 2002}} held that the execution of intellectually disabled inmates is unconstitutional. Second, in 2005, the court's decision in Roper v. SimmonsRoper v. Simmons, {{ussc|543|551|2005}} struck down executions for offenders under the age of 18 at the time of the crime. As of 2018, some recalcitrant states continue to deviate from the 2002 decision.{{Cite web|url=https://www.lawschool.cornell.edu/news/law-school-celebrates-john-blumes-book-intellectual-disability-and-the-death-penalty/|title=Law School Celebrates John Blume's Book Intellectual Disability and the Death Penalty|author=Cornell Law School Staff|date=31 May 2018|publisher=Cornell Law School|access-date=28 December 2024}}

In the 2008 case Kennedy v. Louisiana, the court also held 5–4 that the death penalty is unconstitutional when applied to non-homicidal crimes against the person, including child rape. Only two death row inmates (both in Louisiana) were affected by the decision.{{cite news|url=http://www.cnn.com/2008/CRIME/06/25/scotus.child.rape/index.html|title=Child rapists can't be executed, Supreme Court rules|first=Bill|last=Mears|publisher=CNN|date=June 25, 2008|access-date=May 7, 2017}} Nevertheless, the ruling came less than five months before the 2008 presidential election and was criticized by both major party candidates Barack Obama and John McCain.{{Cite news |author=Kugler |first=Sara |date=June 25, 2008 |title=Obama Disagrees With High Court on Child Rape Case |work=ABC News |url=https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/WireStory?id=5246858&page=1 |url-status=dead |access-date=May 7, 2017 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090524044856/https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/WireStory?id=5246858&page=1 |archive-date=May 24, 2009}}

In 2023, 2024 and 2025, Florida, Tennessee and Idaho passed laws that enact the death penalty for child rape, in defiance of Kennedy v. Louisiana.{{Cite web |title=DeSantis signs law allowing death penalty for child rape, defying US Supreme Court ruling |url=https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2023/05/01/desantis-allows-death-penalty-child-rape-defies-supreme-court/70171868007/ |access-date=2023-05-02 |website=USA Today |language=en-US}}{{cite web | url=https://apnews.com/article/child-rape-death-penalty-tennessee-6edde756a71b0ae26eea703d1f69b572 | title=Tennessee governor OKs bill allowing death penalty for child rape convictions | website=Associated Press News | date=May 14, 2024 }}{{cite news|url=https://idahocapitalsun.com/2025/03/27/idaho-governor-signs-into-law-child-sex-abuse-death-penalty-bill-despite-u-s-supreme-court-ruling/|title=Idaho governor signs into law child sex abuse death penalty bill, despite U.S. Supreme Court ruling|date=March 27, 2025|work=Idaho Capital Sun}}

In 2004, New York's and Kansas' capital sentencing schemes were struck down by their respective states' highest courts. Kansas successfully appealed the Kansas Supreme Court decision to the United States Supreme Court, which reinstated the statute in Kansas v. Marsh (2006), holding it did not violate the U.S. Constitution. The decision of the New York Court of Appeals was based on the state constitution, making unavailable any appeal. The state lower house has since blocked all attempts to reinstate the death penalty by adopting a valid sentencing scheme.{{cite news|url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A47871-2005Apr12.html|title=In N.Y., Lawmakers Vote Not to Reinstate Capital Punishment|newspaper=The Washington Post|date=April 13, 2005|author=Powell, Michael|access-date=May 14, 2019|quote=NEW YORK, April 12 – New York's death penalty is no more. A legislative committee tossed out a bill Tuesday aimed at reinstating the state's death penalty, which a court had suspended last year. It was an extraordinary bit of drama, not least because a top Democrat who once strongly supported capital punishment led the fight to end it.|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190514154454/http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A47871-2005Apr12.html?noredirect=on|archive-date=May 14, 2019|url-status=live}} In 2016, Delaware's death penalty statute was also struck down by its state supreme court.{{cite web|url=http://www.delawareonline.com/story/news/local/2016/08/02/court-delawares-death-penalty-law-unconstitutional/87963012/|title=Top court: Delaware's death penalty law unconstitutional|date=August 2, 2016|access-date=May 14, 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170701135847/http://www.delawareonline.com/story/news/local/2016/08/02/court-delawares-death-penalty-law-unconstitutional/87963012/|archive-date=July 1, 2017|url-status=dead}}

In 2007, New Jersey became the first state to repeal the death penalty by legislative vote since Gregg v. Georgia,{{Cite news | url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/12/13/AR2007121301302.html | newspaper=The Washington Post | title=N.J. Approves Abolition of Death Penalty; Corzine to Sign | first=Keith B. | last=Richburg | date=December 14, 2007 | access-date=May 14, 2019 | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190514154907/http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/12/13/AR2007121301302.html | archive-date=May 14, 2019 | url-status=live }} followed by New Mexico in 2009,{{in lang|en}} Maria Medina, [http://www.krqe.com/dpp/news/politics/politics_krqe_santa_fe_governor_ok_with_some_death_sentences_200903192257 "Governor OK with Astorga capital case"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090826080912/https://www.krqe.com/dpp/news/politics/politics_krqe_santa_fe_governor_ok_with_some_death_sentences_200903192257 |date=August 26, 2009 }}{{Cite news |url=https://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5iUcLhqwlBEQ6-b-J7rzRd2lSuv3g |title=New Mexico governor bans death penalty |archive-date=April 18, 2010 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100418173921/http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5iUcLhqwlBEQ6-b-J7rzRd2lSuv3g |date=March 18, 2009 |access-date=December 23, 2009 |agency=Agence France-Presse |quote=New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson made his state the 15th in the nation to outlaw capital punishment when he signed a law abolishing the death penalty, his office said. |url-status=dead }} Illinois in 2011, Connecticut in 2012,{{cite web |url=http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org/recent-legislation-death-penalty-repeal-passes-second-connecticut-house-awaits-governors-signature |title=RECENT LEGISLATION: Death Penalty Repeal Passes Second Connecticut House, Awaits Governor's Signature {{pipe}} Death Penalty Information Center |publisher=Deathpenaltyinfo.org |date=April 12, 2012 |access-date=May 14, 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190514155031/https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/recent-legislation-death-penalty-repeal-passes-second-connecticut-house-awaits-governors-signature |archive-date=May 14, 2019 |url-status=live }}{{cite news|url=https://www.foxnews.com/politics/connecticut-governor-signs-bill-to-repeal-death-penalty/|title=Connecticut governor signs bill to repeal death penalty|date=April 25, 2012|publisher=FOX News Network, LLC.|access-date=May 14, 2019|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190514155148/https://www.foxnews.com/politics/connecticut-governor-signs-bill-to-repeal-death-penalty|archive-date=May 14, 2019|url-status=live}} and Maryland in 2013.{{cite news|title=Md. General Assembly repeals death penalty|url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/md-politics/md-general-assembly-repeals-death-penalty/2013/03/15/c8bee4f0-8d72-11e2-9838-d62f083ba93f_story.html|newspaper=The Washington Post|access-date=May 14, 2019|first=John|last=Wagner|date=March 16, 2013}} The repeals were not retroactive, but in New Jersey, Illinois and Maryland, governors commuted all death sentences after enacting the new law.{{cite web |title= Clemency |url= http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org/clemency|publisher= deathpenaltyinfo.org |access-date= April 6, 2016}} In Connecticut, the Connecticut Supreme Court ruled in 2015 that the repeal must be retroactive. In New Mexico, capital punishment for certain offenses is still possible for National Guard members in Title 32 status under the state's Code of Military Justice (NMSA 20–12), and for capital offenses committed prior to the repeal of the state's death penalty statute.{{Cite web |title=2016 New Mexico Statutes :: Chapter 20 - Military Affairs :: Article 12 - Code of Military Justice |url=https://law.justia.com/codes/new-mexico/2016/chapter-20/article-12/ |access-date=May 13, 2023 |website=Justia Law |language=en}}{{cite web |date=August 13, 2015 |title=Connecticut's highest court overturns its death penalty |url=https://edition.cnn.com/2015/08/13/us/connecticut-death-penalty/ |access-date=April 6, 2016 |publisher=CNN}}

Nebraska's legislature also passed a repeal in 2015, but a referendum campaign gathered enough signatures to suspend it. Capital punishment was reinstated by popular vote on November 8, 2016. The same day, California's electorate defeated a proposal to repeal the death penalty, and adopted another initiative to speed up its appeal process.{{cite web |title= Voters in California, Oklahoma, and Nebraska chose to preserve and strengthen the death penalty |date= November 9, 2016|url= https://www.vice.com/en/article/death-penalty-proponents-win-in-california-oklahoma-and-nebraska/|publisher= news.vice.com |access-date= November 9, 2016}}

On October 11, 2018, Washington state became the 20th state to abolish capital punishment when its state Supreme Court deemed the death penalty unconstitutional on the grounds of racial bias.{{cite web |url=http://www.courts.wa.gov/opinions/pdf/880867.pdf |id=No. 88086-7 |title=State Of Washington, respondent, v. Allen Eugene Gregory |date=October 11, 2018 |website=Washington Supreme Court}} The state later abolished it through legislation passed in 2023.{{cite news |last=Baumann |first=Lisa |date=April 20, 2023 |title=Washington state officially abolishes death penalty |url=https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/washington-state-officially-abolishes-death-penalty/ |work=The Seattle Times |agency=Associated Press |access-date=April 20, 2023}}

New Hampshire became the 21st state to abolish capital punishment on May 30, 2019, when its state senate overrode Governor Sununu's veto by a vote of 16–8.{{cite web|url=https://www.concordmonitor.com/New-Hampshire-Senate-votes-on-whether-to-repeal-the-death-penalty-for-good-25909263|title=Senate overrides Sununu ending death penalty in New Hampshire|date=May 30, 2019|website=Concord Monitor|access-date=May 30, 2019}}

Colorado became the 22nd state to abolish capital punishment when governor Jared Polis signed a repeal bill on March 23, 2020, and commuted all existing death sentences in the state to life without parole.{{Cite news|url=https://coloradosun.com/2020/03/23/colorado-death-penalty-repeal/|title=Governor signs bill abolishing Colorado's death penalty, commutes sentences of state's 3 death row inmates|date=March 23, 2020|newspaper=The Colorado Sun}}

Virginia became the 23rd state to abolish capital punishment, and the first Southern state to do so when governor Ralph Northam signed a repeal bill on March 24, 2021, and commuted all existing death sentences in the state to life without parole.{{cite news|last=Schneider|first=Gregory S.|date=March 24, 2021|title=Virginia abolishes the death penalty, becoming the first Southern state to ban its use|newspaper=The Washington Post|url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/virginia-politics/virginia-abolish-death-penalty/2021/03/24/8d6eda46-8bf6-11eb-9423-04079921c915_story.html|access-date=March 24, 2021|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210324190833/https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/virginia-politics/virginia-abolish-death-penalty/2021/03/24/8d6eda46-8bf6-11eb-9423-04079921c915_story.html|archive-date=March 24, 2021|url-status=dead}}{{cite news|last=Kelley|first=Alexandra|date=March 24, 2021|title=Virginia officially first Southern state to abolish the death penalty|work=The Hill|url=https://thehill.com/changing-america/respect/equality/544739-virginia-officially-first-southern-state-to-abolish-the|access-date=March 24, 2021}}

Since Furman, 11 states have organized popular votes dealing with the death penalty through the initiative and referendum process. All resulted in a vote for reinstating it, rejecting its abolition, expanding its application field, specifying in the state constitution that it is not unconstitutional, or expediting the appeal process in capital cases.

The advocacy group Conservatives Concerned About the Death Penalty is creating a national network of Republican and Libertarian legislators at the state level to introduce bills aimed at abolishing or limiting the death penalty. The issue is framed along the values of pro-life, limited government, and fiscal responsibility.{{Cite web |last=Bates |first=Clara |date=January 10, 2024 |title=Group of Republican lawmakers raise concerns about Missouri death penalty |url=https://missouriindependent.com/2024/01/10/group-of-republican-lawmakers-raise-concerns-about-missouri-death-penalty/ |access-date=January 11, 2024 |website=Missouri Independent |language=en-US}}

A total of 23 states, plus the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico, have abolished the death penalty for all crimes. Below is a table of the states and the date that the state abolished the death penalty.{{Cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/12/us/california-death-penalty.html|title=California Death Penalty Suspended; 737 Inmates Get Stay of Execution (Published 2019)|first=Tim|last=Arango|newspaper=The New York Times|date=March 13, 2019}}{{cite web|url=https://deathpenalty.procon.org/view.resource.php?resourceID=001172|title=31 States with the Death Penalty and 21 States with Death Penalty Bans - Death Penalty - ProCon.org|website=deathpenalty.procon.org|access-date=May 2, 2018}}{{Cite news|url=https://www.pri.org/stories/2014-02-12/washington-joins-long-list-states-reconsidering-or-abolishing-death-penalty|title=Washington joins long list of states reconsidering or abolishing the death penalty|work=Public Radio International|access-date=May 2, 2018|language=en-US}}{{Cite news|url=https://www.freep.com/story/news/2015/05/04/death-penalty/26879705/|title=The day Michigan became 1st state to ban death penalty|work=Detroit Free Press|access-date=May 2, 2018|language=en}}{{cite web|url=https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/delaware-1|title=Delaware {{!}} Death Penalty Information Center|website=deathpenaltyinfo.org|language=en|access-date=May 2, 2018}}{{Cite news|url=https://statelaws.findlaw.com/minnesota-law/minnesota-capital-punishment-laws.html|title=Minnesota Capital Punishment Laws – FindLaw|work=Findlaw|access-date=May 2, 2018|language=en-US}}{{Cite news|url=https://www.npr.org/2018/10/11/656570464/washington-state-strikes-down-death-penalty-citing-racial-bias|title=Washington State Strikes Down Death Penalty, Citing Racial Bias|work=NPR.org|access-date=October 11, 2018|language=en}}{{cite web|url=https://www.denverpost.com/2020/03/23/colorado-abolish-death-penalty/|title=Colorado abolishes death penalty; governor commutes sentences of 3 on death row|date=March 23, 2020|website=The Denver Post|language=en-US|access-date=March 24, 2020}} Michigan became the first English-speaking territory in the world to abolish capital punishment in 1847. Although treason remained a crime punishable by the death penalty in Michigan despite the 1847 abolition, no one was ever executed under that law, and Michigan's 1962 Constitutional Convention codified that the death penalty was fully abolished.{{Cite news|url=https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/michigan-0|title=Michigan: General Information|work=Death Penalty Information Center|access-date=January 8, 2019|language=en-US}} Vermont has abolished the death penalty for all crimes, but has an invalid death penalty statue for treason.{{cite web|url=http://legislature.vermont.gov/statutes/section/13/075/03401|title=Vermont Laws|website=legislature.vermont.gov|language=en}} When it abolished the death penalty in 2019, New Hampshire explicitly did not commute the death sentence of the sole person remaining on the state's death row, Michael K. Addison.DeWitt, Ethan. [https://www.concordmonitor.com/Capital-Beat-After-death-penalty-repeal-what-s-next-for-Michael-Addison-25934408 "Capital Beat: After death penalty repeal, what’s next for Michael Addison?"], Concord Monitor, June 1, 2019.Solomon, Dave. [https://www.unionleader.com/news/politics/state/death-penalty-repealed-nh-senate-votes-to-override-veto/article_b69e2cc0-720f-56f6-a211-b40db90ebbce.html "Death penalty repealed; NH Senate votes to override veto"], New Hampshire Union Leader, May 30, 2019.

File:Capital Punishment in the United States by State Since 1970.gif

File:Execution_chamber,_Florida.jpg]]

In 1982, Texas carried out the first execution by lethal injection in world history and lethal injection subsequently became the preferred method throughout the country, displacing the electric chair.{{cite web |url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/bbcthree/article/cd49a818-5645-4a94-832e-d22860804779 |title=Life and Death Row: How the lethal injection kills |last=Bryant |first=Ben |date=March 5, 2018 |publisher=BBC |access-date=March 14, 2021}} From 1976 to December 8, 2016, there were 1,533 executions, of which 1,349 were by lethal injection, 163 by electrocution, 11 by gas chamber, 3 by hanging, and 3 by firing squad.{{cite web |title= USA Executions 2016 (as of 12/8/16) |url=https://people.smu.edu/rhalperi/exec16.html |publisher= people.smu.edu |access-date=March 16, 2017}} The South had the great majority of these executions, with 1,249; there were 190 in the Midwest, 86 in the West, and only 4 in the Northeast. No state in the Northeast has conducted an execution since Connecticut, now abolitionist, in 2005. The state of Texas alone conducted 571 executions, over 1/3 of the total; the states of Texas, Virginia (now abolitionist), and Oklahoma combined make up over half the total, with 802 executions between them.{{cite web|url=https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/number-executions-state-and-region-1976|title=Number of Executions by State and Region Since 1976 – Death Penalty Information Center|website=deathpenaltyinfo.org}} 17 executions have been conducted by the federal government.{{cite web|url=https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/state-and-federal-info/federal-death-penalty/executions-under-the-federal-death-penalty|title=Executions Under the Federal Death Penalty|work=Death Penalty Information Center|access-date=March 14, 2021}} Executions increased in frequency until 1999; 98 prisoners were executed that year. Since 1999, the number of executions has greatly decreased, and the 17 executions in 2020 were the fewest since 1991. A 2016 poll conducted by Pew Research, found that support nationwide for the death penalty in the U.S. had fallen below 50% for the first time since the beginning of the post-Gregg era.{{Cite web |last=Oliphant |first=J. Baxter |title=Support for death penalty lowest in more than four decades |url=https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2016/09/29/support-for-death-penalty-lowest-in-more-than-four-decades/ |access-date=May 13, 2023 |website=Pew Research Center |date=September 29, 2016 |language=en-US}}

The death penalty became an issue during the 1988 presidential election. It came up in the October 13, 1988, debate between the two presidential nominees George H. W. Bush and Michael Dukakis, when Bernard Shaw, the moderator of the debate, asked Dukakis, "Governor, if Kitty Dukakis [his wife] were raped and murdered, would you favor an irrevocable death penalty for the killer?" Dukakis replied, "No, I don't, and I think you know that I've opposed the death penalty during all of my life. I don't see any evidence that it's a deterrent, and I think there are better and more effective ways to deal with violent crime." Bush was elected, and many, including Dukakis himself, cite the statement as the beginning of the end of his campaign.{{cite web |title= Obama's non-Dukakis answer |url=http://firstread.nbcnews.com/_news/2008/06/25/4433621-obamas-non-dukakis-answer |publisher= nbcnews.com |access-date=April 8, 2016}}

In 1996, Congress passed the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act to streamline the appeal process in capital cases. The bill was signed into law by President Bill Clinton, who had endorsed capital punishment during his 1992 presidential campaign.[https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/antiterrorism_and_effective_death_penalty_act_of_1996_(aedpa) Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996 (AEDPA)] Retrieved 16 May 2024

A study found that at least 34 of the 749 executions carried out in the U.S. between 1977 and 2001, or 4.5%, involved "unanticipated problems or delays that caused, at least arguably, unnecessary agony for the prisoner or that reflect gross incompetence of the executioner". The rate of these "botched executions" remained steady over the period.Borg and Radelet, pp. 144–147 A study published in The Lancet in 2005 found that in 43% of cases of lethal injection, the blood level of hypnotics in the prisoner was insufficient to ensure unconsciousness.Van Norman p. 287 Nonetheless, the Supreme Court ruled in 2008 (Baze v. Rees), again in 2015 (Glossip v. Gross), and a third time in 2019 (Bucklew v. Precythe), that lethal injection does not constitute cruel and unusual punishment.{{Cite book|archive-date=May 8, 2021 |title=Capital Punishment - Oxford Handbooks |chapter=Capital Punishment |year=2011 |publisher=Oxford University Press |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210508160634/https://www.oxfordhandbooks.com/view/10.1093/oxfordhb/9780195395082.001.0001/oxfordhb-9780195395082-e-24 |access-date=May 13, 2023 |doi=10.1093/oxfordhb/9780195395082.001.0001 |isbn=978-0-19-539508-2 |url=https://www.oxfordhandbooks.com/view/10.1093/oxfordhb/9780195395082.001.0001/oxfordhb-9780195395082-e-24 |editor-last1=Tonry |editor-first1=Michael }}{{cite web |url=https://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/18pdf/17-8151_new_0pm1.pdf |id=17-8151 |title= Bucklew v. Precythe |date= January 4, 2019 |website=United States Supreme Court}}

On July 25, 2019, Attorney General William Barr ordered the resumption of federal executions after a 16-year hiatus, and set five execution dates for December 2019 and January 2020.{{citation |last1=Kupperman |first1=Tammy |title=Barr directs federal government to reinstate death penalty, schedule the execution of 5 death row inmates |date=July 25, 2019 |url=https://edition.cnn.com/2019/07/25/politics/justice-department-capital-punishment-barr/index.html |work=CNN |access-date=July 25, 2019 |last2=de Vogue |first2=Ariane |last3=Stracqualursi |first3=Vernocia}}{{Cite web |title=AG Barr orders reinstatement of the federal death penalty |url=https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/justice-department/ag-barr-orders-reinstatement-federal-death-penalty-n1034451 |access-date=May 14, 2023 |website=NBC News |date=July 25, 2019 |language=en}}{{cite web|url=https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2019/07/justice-department-bill-barr-orders-revival-federal-executions-lethal-injection.html|title=The Federal Government Plans to Revive the Death Penalty After 16 Years|first=Chip|last=Brownlee|date=July 25, 2019|website=Slate Magazine}}{{cite web|first=David|last=Smith|url=http://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/jul/25/death-penalty-capital-punishment-us-justice-department-resumes-executions|title=US justice department resumes use of death penalty and schedules five executions|date=July 25, 2019|website=The Guardian}} After the Supreme Court upheld a stay on these executions,{{cite web|url=https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/supreme-court/supreme-court-keeps-federal-executions-hold-n1097521|title=Supreme Court keeps federal executions on hold|website=NBC News|date=December 7, 2019 }} the stay was lifted in June 2020 and four executions were rescheduled for July and August 2020.{{cite news|url=https://apnews.com/0238930de18b029e4b31ea1114d4a0d8 |title= AP Exclusive: New dates set to begin federal executions|website= apnews.com |agency= Associated Press|access-date=June 16, 2020}} The federal government executed Daniel Lewis Lee on July 14, 2020. He became the first convict executed by the federal government since 2003. Before Trump's term ended in January 2021, the federal government carried out a total of 13 executions.{{Cite web |date=April 20, 2021 |title=Trump administration carries out 13th and final execution |url=https://apnews.com/article/donald-trump-wildlife-coronavirus-pandemic-crime-terre-haute-28e44cc5c026dc16472751bbde0ead50 |access-date=May 13, 2023 |website=AP NEWS |language=en}}

In 1632, 24 years after the first recorded male execution in the colonies, Jane Champion became the first woman known to have been lawfully executed. She was sentenced to death by hanging after she was convicted of infanticide; around two-thirds of women executed in the 17th and early 18th centuries were convicted of child murder. Champion was a married woman; it is not known whether her illicit lover, William Gallopin, also convicted of their child's murder, was also executed, although it appears he was sentenced to death.{{cite book|last=Baker|first=David V.|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=QKUHCwAAQBAJ&pg=PA75|title=Women and Capital Punishment in the United States: An Analytical History

|location=Jefferson, NC|publisher=McFarland|year=2016|page=75|isbn=9780786499502}}{{cite web|url=https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/part-i-history-death-penalty#america|title=Part I: History of the Death Penalty {{!}} Death Penalty Information Center|website=deathpenaltyinfo.org|language=en|access-date=November 8, 2017}} For the Puritans, infanticide was the worst form of murder.{{cite book|last=Jones|first=Ann|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=AGA_FEsKRioC&pg=PA76|title=Women Who Kill|location=New York, NY|publisher=The Feminist Press at the City University of New York|orig-year=1980|year=2009|page=76ff|isbn=9781558616073}} (Originally published by Holt, Rinehart and Winston)

Women accounted for just one fifth of all executions between 1632 and 1759, in the colonial United States. Women were more likely to be acquitted, and the relatively low number of executions of women may have been impacted by the scarcity of female laborers. Slavery was not yet widespread in the 17th century mainland and planters relied mostly on Irish indentured servants. To maintain subsistence levels in those days everyone had to do farm work, including women.

The second half of the 17th century saw the executions of 14 women and 6 men who were accused of witchcraft during the witch hunt hysteria and the Salem Witch Trials. While both men and women were executed, 80% of the accusations were towards women, so the list of executions disproportionately affected men by a margin of 6 (actual) to 4 (expected), i.e. 50% more men were executed than expected from the percentage of accused who were men.{{Cite book|url=https://archive.org/details/devilinshapeofwo00karl_0|url-access=registration|page=[https://archive.org/details/devilinshapeofwo00karl_0/page/274 274]|title=The Devil in the Shape of a Woman: Witchcraft in Colonial New England|last=Karlsen|first=Carol F.|date=April 17, 1998|publisher=W. W. Norton & Company|isbn=9780393347197|language=en}}

Other notable female executions include Mary Surratt, Margie Velma Barfield and Wanda Jean Allen. Mary Surratt was executed by hanging in 1865 after being convicted of co-conspiring to assassinate Abraham Lincoln.{{cite web|url=http://www.surrattmuseum.org/mary-surratt|title=Mary Surratt's Story – Surratt House Museum|website=www.surrattmuseum.org|language=en|access-date=November 8, 2017|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171104011659/http://www.surrattmuseum.org/mary-surratt|archive-date=November 4, 2017|url-status=dead}} Margie Velma Barfield was convicted of murder and when she was executed by lethal injection in 1984, she became the first woman to be executed since the ban on capital punishment was lifted in 1976.{{cite web|url=http://www.clarkprosecutor.org/html/death/US/barfield029.htm|title=Velma Margie Barfield #29|website=www.clarkprosecutor.org|access-date=November 8, 2017}} Wanda Jean Allen was convicted of murder in 1989 and had a high-profile execution by lethal injection in January 2001. She was the first black woman to be executed in the US since 1954.{{cite web|url=http://www.clarkprosecutor.org/html/death/US/allen687.htm|title=Wanda Jean Allen #687|website=www.clarkprosecutor.org|access-date=November 8, 2017}} Allen's appellate lawyers did not deny her guilt, but claimed that prosecutors capitalized on her low IQ, race and homosexuality in their representations of her as a murderer at trial. This approach did not work.{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=kKcHCwAAQBAJ&pg=PA389|title=Women and Capital Punishment in the United States: An Analytical History|last=Baker|first=David V.|date=December 31, 2015|publisher=McFarland|isbn=9781476622880|language=en}}

The federal government executes women infrequently. Ethel Rosenberg, convicted of espionage, was executed in the electric chair on June 19, 1953, and Bonnie Brown Heady, convicted of kidnapping and murder, was executed in the gas chamber later that same year on December 18. Since Heady, only one more woman has been executed by the federal government: Lisa Montgomery, convicted of killing a pregnant woman and cutting out and kidnapping her baby, by lethal injection on January 13, 2021. Her execution had been stayed while her lawyers argued that she had mental health issues, but the Supreme Court lifted the stay.{{cite news|last=Croft|first=Jay|date=October 17, 2020|title=US government to execute first woman since 1953|url=https://www.cnn.com/2020/10/17/us/lisa-montgomery-brandon-bernard-executions-trnd/index.html|access-date=October 17, 2020|website=CNN}}{{cite web|last=Jeltsen|first=Melissa|date=January 12, 2021|title=Only Woman On Federal Death Row Spared Execution For Now|url=https://www.huffpost.com/entry/lisa-montgomery-execution-blocked_n_5ffd3c9ec5b6c77d85e9a2bb|access-date=January 12, 2021|website=HuffPost|language=en}}

In 1959, Leonard Shockley was put to the death in Maryland, becoming the last person in the United States who was executed while still a juvenile at the time of their execution. Kent v. United States (1966), turned the tides for juvenile capital punishment sentencing when it limited the waiver discretion juvenile courts had. Before this case, juvenile courts had the freedom to waiver juvenile cases to criminal courts without a hearing, which did not make the waiving process consistent across states. Discussions about abolishing the death penalty started occurring between 1983 and 1986. In 1987, Thompson v. Oklahoma, the Supreme Court threw away William Wayne Thompson's death sentence due to it being cruel and unusual punishment, as he was 15 years old at the time of the crime he committed; the judgment established that "evolving standards of decency" made it inappropriate to apply the death penalty for people under 16 years old at the time of their capital crime,{{Cite journal|last=Cothern|first=Lynn|date=November 2000|title=Juveniles and the Death Penalty|url=https://www.ncjrs.gov/pdffiles1/ojjdp/184748.pdf|journal=Coordinating Council on Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention|pages=1–16|via=NCJRS}} although Thompson held that it was still constitutional to sentence juveniles 16 years or older to the death penalty.

It was not until Roper v. Simmons that the juvenile death penalty was abolished due to the United States Supreme Court finding that the execution of juveniles is in conflict with the Eighth Amendment and Fourteenth Amendment, which deal with cruel and unusual punishment. Prior to completely abolishing the juvenile death penalty in 2005, any juvenile aged 16 years or older could be sentenced to death in some states, the last of whom was Scott Hain, executed at the age of 32 in Oklahoma for the 2003 burning of two people to death during a robbery at age 17.{{Cite book|title=The Encyclopedia of Corrections|last=Maier|first=Shana|publisher=John Wiley and Sons Inc.|year=2017}} Prior to Roper, there were 71 people on death row in the United States for crimes committed as juveniles.{{Cite web|url=https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/policy-issues/juveniles/prior-to-roper-v-simmons|title=The Juvenile Death Penalty Prior to Roper v. Simmons|website=Death Penalty Information Center}} Since 2005, there have been no executions nor discussion of executing juveniles in the United States.

Aggravating factors for seeking capital punishment of murder vary greatly among death penalty states. California has twenty-two.{{cite web|title=California Penal Code § 190.2|url=http://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/codes_displaySection.xhtml?sectionNum=190.2&lawCode=PEN|work=California Office of Legislative Counsel|access-date=March 16, 2019}} Some aggravating circumstances are nearly universal, such as robbery-murder, murder involving rape of the victim, and murder of an on-duty police officer.{{cite web |title=Aggravating Factors by State |url=http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org/aggravating-factors-capital-punishment-state |access-date=April 28, 2017 |website=Death Penalty Information Center}}

Several states have included child murder to their list of aggravating factors, but the victim's age under which the murder is punishable by death varies. In 2011, Texas raised this age from six to ten.{{cite web |title= AN ACT relating to the murder of a child as a capital offense. |url=http://www.legis.state.tx.us/tlodocs/82R/billtext/html/SB00377F.HTM |publisher= legis.state.tx.us |access-date=March 24, 2016}}

In some states, the high number of aggravating factors has been criticized on account of giving prosecutors too much discretion in choosing cases where they believe capital punishment is warranted. In California especially, an official commission proposed, in 2008, to reduce these factors to five (multiple murders, torture murder, murder of a police officer, murder committed in jail, and murder related to another felony).{{cite web |title= Official recommendations on the fair administration of the death penalty in California |url= http://www.ccfaj.org/rr-dp-official.html |publisher= ccfaj.org |access-date= March 24, 2016 |archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20160314205412/http://www.ccfaj.org/rr-dp-official.html |archive-date= March 14, 2016 |url-status= dead }} Columnist Charles Lane went further, and proposed that murder related to a felony other than rape should no longer be a capital crime when there is only one victim killed.{{Cite book |last=Lane |first=Charles |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=MlO9mAEACAAJ |title=Stay of Execution: Saving the Death Penalty from Itself |date=2010 |publisher=Rowman & Littlefield Publishers |isbn=978-1-4422-0378-5 |pages=110–111 |language=en}}

In order for a person to be eligible for a death sentence when convicted of aggravated first-degree murder, the jury or court (when there is not a jury) must determine at least one of sixteen aggravating factors that existed during the crime's commission. The following is a list of the 16 aggravating factors under federal law.{{cite web|url=https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/3592|title=18 U.S. Code § 3592 – Mitigating and aggravating factors to be considered in determining whether a sentence of death is justified|website=LII / Legal Information Institute|language=en|access-date=May 4, 2018}}

1. The murder was committed while committing another felony.{{cite book |last1=Lehman |first1=Jeffrey |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ISBN9780787663742 |title=West's Encyclopedia of American Law |volume=7 |last2=Phelps |first2=Shirelle |date=2005 |publisher=Thomson/Gale |isbn=9780787663742 |location=Detroit |page=141 }}{{Dead link|date=September 2023 |bot=InternetArchiveBot |fix-attempted=yes }}
2. Offender was convicted of a separate felony involving a firearm prior to the aggravated murder.
3. Being convicted of a separate felony where death or life imprisonment was authorized prior to the aggravated murder.
4. Being convicted of any separate violent felony prior to the aggravated murder.
5. The offender put the lives of one or more other persons in danger of death during the commission of the crime.
6. The offender committed the crime in an especially cruel, heinous, or depraved manner.
7. The offender committed the crime for financial gain.
8. The offender committed the crime for monetary gain.{{clarify inline|reason=How is this a separate factor from "financial gain"?|date=March 2025}}
9. The murder was premeditated, involved planning in order to be carried out, or the offender showed early signs of committing the crime, such as keeping a journal of the crime's details.{{Cite news|url=http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/assessment/2004/04/the_depressive_and_the_psychopath.html|title=The Depressive and the Psychopath|last=Cullen|first=Dave|date=April 20, 2004|work=Slate|access-date=May 3, 2018|language=en-US|issn=1091-2339}} and posting things on the Internet.{{Cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2018/02/15/us/nikolas-cruz-florida-shooting.html|title=Nikolas Cruz, Florida Shooting Suspect, Showed 'Every Red Flag'|date=February 15, 2018|work=The New York Times|access-date=May 4, 2018|language=en-US|issn=0362-4331}}
10. The offender was previously convicted of at least two drug offenses.
11. The victim would not have been able to defend themselves while being attacked.
12. The offender was previously convicted of a federal drug offense.
13. The offender was involved in a long-term business of selling drugs to minors.
14. A high-ranking official was murdered, such as the president of the United States, the leader of another country, or a police officer.
15. The offender was previously convicted of sexual assault or child rape.
16. During the crime's commission, the offender killed or tried to kill multiple people.{{Cite news|url=https://www.crimemuseum.org/crime-library/serial-killers/serials-killers-vs-mass-murderers/|title=Serial Killers vs. Mass Murderers – Crime Museum|work=Crime Museum|access-date=May 4, 2018|language=en-US}}

The opinion of the court in Kennedy v. Louisiana says that the ruling does not apply to "treason, espionage, terrorism, and drug kingpin activity, which are offenses against the State".Kennedy v. Louisiana, 554 U.S. 407, 437 (2007); see also {{cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/26/washington/26scotuscnd.html|title=Supreme Court Rejects Death Penalty for Child Rape|date=June 26, 2008|access-date=March 11, 2011|first=Linda|last=Greenhouse|newspaper=The New York Times|quote=The court went beyond the question in the case to rule out the death penalty for any individual crime – as opposed to "offenses against the state", such as treason or espionage – "where the victim's life was not taken.}}

Treason, espionage and large-scale drug trafficking are all capital crimes under federal law. Treason is also punishable by death in six states (Arkansas, California, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, and South Carolina). Large-scale drug trafficking is punishable by death in two states (Florida and Missouri),{{cite web |year=2008 |title=Death Penalty for Offenses Other Than Murder |url=https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/facts-and-research/crimes-punishable-by-death/death-penalty-for-offenses-other-than-murder |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230624031909/https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/facts-and-research/crimes-punishable-by-death/death-penalty-for-offenses-other-than-murder |archive-date=June 24, 2023 |access-date=November 22, 2023 |publisher=Death Penalty Information Center}}{{cbignore|bot=medic}} and aircraft hijacking in two others (Georgia and Mississippi). Vermont has an invalidated pre-Furman statute allowing capital punishment for treason despite abolishing capital punishment in 1965.{{cite web|url=http://legislature.vermont.gov/statutes/section/13/075/03401|title=§ 3401. Definition and punishment of treason|publisher=legislature.vermont.gov|access-date=December 9, 2016}}

The legal administration of the death penalty in the United States typically involves five steps: prosecutorial decision to seek the death penalty, sentencing, direct review, state collateral review, and federal habeas corpus.

Clemency, through which the governor or president of the jurisdiction can unilaterally reduce or abrogate a death sentence, is an executive rather than judicial process.See generally Separation of powers.

While judges in criminal cases can usually impose a harsher prison sentence than the one demanded by prosecution, the death penalty can be handed down only if the accuser has specifically decided to seek it.

In the decades since Furman, new questions have emerged about whether or not prosecutorial arbitrariness has replaced sentencing arbitrariness. A study by Pepperdine University School of Law published in Temple Law Review, surveyed the decision-making process among prosecutors in various states. The authors found that prosecutors' capital punishment filing decisions are marked by local "idiosyncrasies", and that wide prosecutorial discretion remains because of overly broad criteria. California law, for example, has 22 "special circumstances", making nearly all first-degree murders potential capital cases.{{Cite web |last=Wihbey |first=John |date=May 26, 2011 |title=Greater transparency in death penalty decisions |url=https://journalistsresource.org/criminal-justice/transparency-death-penalty/ |access-date=May 13, 2023 |website=The Journalist's Resource |language=en-US}}

A proposed remedy against prosecutorial arbitrariness is to transfer the prosecution of capital cases to the state attorney general.{{cite journal |author=Gershowitz |first=Adam M. |date=March 2010 |title=Statewide Capital Punishment: The Case for Eliminating Counties' Role in the Death Penalty |url=http://scholarship.law.wm.edu/facpubs/1255/ |journal=63 Vanderbilt Law Review 307-359 (2010) |access-date=March 20, 2016}}

In 2017, Florida governor Rick Scott removed all capital cases from local prosecutor Aramis Ayala because she decided to never seek the death penalty no matter the gravity of the crime.{{cite web |author=Clark |first=Kristen M. |title=Florida Supreme Court backs Gov. Scott in Orlando death-penalty dispute |url=https://www.tampabay.com/florida-politics/buzz/2017/08/31/florida-supreme-court-backs-gov-scott-in-orlando-death-penalty-dispute/ |access-date=May 10, 2020}}

Of the 27 states with the death penalty, 25 require the sentence to be decided by the jury, and 23 require a unanimous decision by the jury.

Two states do not use juries in death penalty cases:

• In Nebraska the sentence is decided by a three-judge panel, which must unanimously agree on death, and the defendant is sentenced to life imprisonment if one of the judges is opposed.{{cite web|url=http://law.justia.com/codes/nebraska/2014/chapter-29/statute-29-2521/ |title=2014 Nebraska Revised Statutes – Chapter 29 – CRIMINAL PROCEDURE – 29-2521 – Sentencing determination proceeding. |publisher=law.justia.com |access-date=April 16, 2017}}
• Montana is the only state where the trial judge decides the sentence alone.{{cite web|url=http://leg.mt.gov/bills/mca/title_0460/chapter_0180/part_0030/section_0010/0460-0180-0030-0010.html |title= 46-18-301. Hearing on imposition of death penalty. |publisher= leg.mt.gov |access-date=April 16, 2017}}

Two states do not require a unanimous jury decision:

• In Alabama, at least 10 jurors must concur, and a retrial happens if the jury deadlocks.{{Cite web |title=State of Alabama Criminal Code 2017 |url=https://inform.alabama.gov/_ALI/PDF/Book/complete_projects/Criminal%20Code%202017.pdf |access-date=27 March 2024 |website=inform.alabama.gov |page=76}}
• In Florida, at least 8 jurors (two-thirds) must concur, and the prosecution can pursue a retrial if the jury deadlocks.{{Cite web |title=Statute 921.141 - Sentence of death or life imprisonment for capital felonies; further proceedings to determine sentence |url=http://www.leg.state.fl.us/statutes/index.cfm?App_mode=Display_Statute&Search_String=&URL=0900-0999/0921/Sections/0921.141.html |access-date=27 March 2024 |website=leg.state.fl.us}}

In all states in which the jury is involved, only death-qualified prospective jurors can be selected in such a jury, to exclude both people who will always vote for the death sentence and those who are categorically opposed to it. However, the states differ on what happens if the penalty phase results in a hung jury:{{cite web |title= Provisions of state and federal statutes concerning sentence if capital sentencing jury cannot agree |url=http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org/documents/JuryDeadlockLaws.pdf |publisher= A. Parrent, Conn. Public Def |access-date= March 15, 2016}}{{cite web |title= SB 280: Sentencing for Capital Felonies |url=http://www.flsenate.gov/Session/Bill/2017/0280/ |publisher= flsenate.gov |access-date= March 15, 2017}}

• In five states (Alabama, Arizona, California, Kentucky and Nevada), a retrial of the penalty phase will be conducted before a different jury (the common-law rule for mistrial).See [https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/22/579/case.html United States v. Perez], 1824
• In two states (Indiana and Missouri), the judge will decide the sentence.
• In the remaining states, a hung jury results in a life sentence, even if only one juror opposed death. Federal law also provides that outcome.{{cite web |title=The Federal Death Penalty System: Supplementary Data, Analysis and Revised Protocols for Capital Case Review|publisher=U.S. Department of Justice|date=June 6, 2001|url=https://www.justice.gov/archive/dag/pubdoc/deathpenaltystudy.htm|quote=If the jury does recommend a capital sentence, the court is required to sentence the defendant accordingly. If the jury does not unanimously agree that the death penalty should be imposed, the defendant is given a lesser (non-capital) sentence. 18 U.S.C. 3593-94.}}

The first outcome is referred as the "true unanimity" rule, while the third has been criticized as the "single-juror veto" rule.{{Cite web |last=Scheidegger |first=Kent S. |date=February 4, 2016 |title=Hurst v. Florida Remedial Legislation and SBP 7068 |url=https://crimeandconsequences.com/crimblog/files/documents/HurstFixBillLtr.pdf |website=crimeandconsequences.com}}

If a defendant is sentenced to death at the trial level, the case then goes into a direct review.See, e.g., [https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/3595- 18 U.S.C. § 3595.] ("In a case in which a sentence of death is imposed, the sentence shall be subject to review by the court of appeals upon appeal by the defendant.") The direct review process is a typical legal appeal. An appellate court examines the record of evidence presented in the trial court and the law that the lower court applied and decides whether the decision was legally sound or not.See generally Appeal. Direct review of a capital sentencing hearing will result in one of three outcomes. If the appellate court finds that no significant legal errors occurred in the capital sentencing hearing, the appellate court will affirm the judgment, or let the sentence stand. If the appellate court finds that significant legal errors did occur, then it will reverse the judgment, or nullify the sentence and order a new capital sentencing hearing.{{Cite web |title=Poland v. Arizona, 476 U.S. 147 (1986) |url=https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/476/147/ |access-date=May 14, 2023 |website=Justia Law |language=en}} If the appellate court finds that no reasonable juror could find the defendant eligible for the death penalty, then it will order the defendant acquitted, or not guilty, of the crime for which he/she was given the death penalty, and order him sentenced to the next most severe punishment for which the offense is eligible. In 1995, about 60 percent of capital punishment decisions were upheld during direct review.{{Cite web|last=Freedman|first=Eric M.|author-link=Eric M. Freedman|date=5 August 2015|title=Giarratano is a Scarecrow: The Right to Counsel in State Capital Post-Conviction Proceedings|url=https://ssrn.com/abstract=874046|publisher=Hofstra University|location=Rochester, NY|ssrn=874046|access-date=28 December 2024}}{{rp|p=29}}{{cite journal|last=Freedman|first=Eric M.|author-link=Eric M. Freedman|date=July 2006|title=Giarratano Is a Scarecrow: The Right to Counsel in State Capital Postconviction Proceedings|url=https://scholarship.law.cornell.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=3035&context=clr|journal=Cornell Law Review|volume=91|issue=5|article-number=3|access-date=28 December 2024}}{{rp|p=1097}}

At times when a death sentence is affirmed on direct review, supplemental methods to oppose the judgment, though less familiar than a typical appeal, do remain. These supplemental remedies are considered collateral review, that is, an avenue for upsetting judgments that have become otherwise final.{{Cite web |title=Teague v. Lane, 489 U.S. 288 (1989) |url=https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/489/288/ |access-date=May 13, 2023 |website=Justia Law |language=en}} Where the prisoner received his death sentence in a state-level trial, as is usually the case, the first step in collateral review is state collateral review, which is often called state habeas corpus. (If the case is a federal death penalty case, it proceeds immediately from direct review to federal habeas corpus.) Although all states have some type of collateral review, the process varies widely from state to state.LaFave, Israel, & King, 6 Crim. Proc. § 28.11(b) (2d ed. 2007). Generally, the purpose of these collateral proceedings is to permit the prisoner to challenge his sentence on grounds that could not have been raised reasonably at trial or on direct review.LaFave, Israel, & King, 6 Crim. Proc. § 28.11(a) (2d ed. 2007). Most often, these are claims, such as ineffective assistance of counsel, which requires the court to consider new evidence outside the original trial record, something courts may not do in an ordinary appeal. State collateral review, though an important step in that it helps define the scope of subsequent review through federal habeas corpus, is rarely successful in and of itself. In 1995, out of the roughly 47% cases which didn't survive postconviction review at the state level, 6 percent of death sentences were overturned on state collateral review.{{rp|p=29}}

{{rp|p=1097}}

In Virginia, state habeas corpus for condemned men are heard by the state supreme court under exclusive original jurisdiction since 1995, immediately after direct review by the same court.{{cite web |title= Code of Virginia – § 8.01-654. When and by whom writ granted; what petition to contain. |url=http://law.lis.virginia.gov/vacode/title8.01/chapter25/section8.01-654/ |publisher=Law.lis.virginia.gov |access-date= March 22, 2016}} This avoids any proceeding before the lower courts, and is in part why Virginia has the shortest time on average between death sentence and execution (less than eight years) and has executed 113 offenders since 1976 with only five remaining on death row {{as of|2017|June|lc=y}}.{{cite web |title= Virginia's execution history |url=https://www.vadp.org/dp-info/virginias-execution-history/ |publisher=vadp.org |access-date=June 4, 2017}}{{cite web |title= Virginia's death row inmates |url=https://www.vadp.org/dp-info/virginias-death-row-inmates/ |publisher=vadp.org |access-date=June 4, 2017}}{{cite web |title=Conviction to Execution "Takes Too Long" |url=http://www.ktrh.com/articles/houston-news-121300/conviction-to-execution-takes-too-long-14356331/ |publisher=ktrh.com |access-date=March 22, 2016 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160407132114/http://www.ktrh.com/articles/houston-news-121300/conviction-to-execution-takes-too-long-14356331/ |archive-date=April 7, 2016 |url-status=dead }}

To reduce litigation delays, other states require convicts to file their state collateral appeal before the completion of their direct appeal,{{cite web |url=http://www.crimeandconsequences.com/crimblog/files/documents/Ch154RegCmnt.pdf |title= OJP Docket No. 1464, Certification Process for State Capital Counsel Systems |publisher=crimeandconsequences.com |access-date= March 15, 2017}} or provide adjudication of direct and collateral attacks together in a "unitary review".{{cite web |url= http://tornado.state.co.us/gov_dir/leg_dir/olls/sl1997/sl_268.htm |title= AN ACT Concerning a unitary procedure for review in class 1 felony cases in which a death sentence is sought as punishment. |publisher= tornado.state.co.us |access-date= March 15, 2017 |archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20151018093526/http://tornado.state.co.us/gov_dir/leg_dir/olls/sl1997/sl_268.htm |archive-date= October 18, 2015 |url-status= dead |df= mdy-all }}

After a death sentence is affirmed in state collateral review, the prisoner may file for federal habeas corpus, which is a unique type of lawsuit that can be brought in federal courts. Federal habeas corpus is a type of collateral review, and it is the only way that state prisoners may attack a death sentence in federal court (other than petitions for certiorari to the United States Supreme Court after both direct review and state collateral review). The scope of federal habeas corpus is governed by the Antiterrorism and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996 (AEDPA), which restricted significantly its previous scope. The purpose of federal habeas corpus is to ensure that state courts, through the process of direct review and state collateral review, have done a reasonable job in protecting the prisoner's federal constitutional rights. Prisoners may also use federal habeas corpus suits to bring forth new evidence that they are innocent of the crime, though to be a valid defense at this late stage in the process, evidence of innocence must be truly compelling.House v. Bell, 126 S. Ct. 2064 (2006) In 1995, 21 percent out of the 68 percent death penalty cases which didn't survive postconviction review were reversed through federal habeas corpus.{{rp|p=29}}{{rp|p=1097}}

James Liebman, a professor of law at Columbia Law School, stated in 1996 that his study found that when habeas corpus petitions in death penalty cases were traced from conviction to completion of the case, there was "a 40 percent success rate in all capital cases from 1978 to 1995".{{Cite news| url=https://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9C05E0DB1039F932A35757C0A960958260 | work=The New York Times | title=Habeas Corpus Studies | date=April 1, 1996 | access-date=April 28, 2010}} Similarly, a study by Ronald Tabak in a law review article puts the success rate in habeas corpus cases involving death row inmates even higher, finding that between "1976 and 1991, approximately 47 percent of the habeas petitions filed by death row inmates were granted".{{cite web|last1=Walpin|first1=Ned|title=The New Speed-up in Habeas Corpus Appeals|url=https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/execution/readings/speed.html|website=Frontline|publisher=PBS|access-date=February 5, 2017}} The different numbers are largely definitional, rather than substantive: Freedam's statistics looks at the percentage of all death penalty cases reversed, while the others look only at cases not reversed prior to habeas corpus review.

A similar process is available for prisoners sentenced to death by the judgment of a federal court.see 28 U.S.C. § 2255.

The AEDPA also provides an expeditious habeas procedure in capital cases for states meeting several requirements set forth in it concerning counsel appointment for death row inmates.28 USC §§ 2261 – 2266 Under this program, federal habeas corpus for condemned prisoners would be decided in about three years from affirmance of the sentence on state collateral review. In 2006, Congress conferred the determination of whether a state fulfilled the requirements to the U.S. attorney general, with a possible appeal of the state to the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. {{as of|2016|March}}, the Department of Justice has still not granted any certifications.{{cite news |title= Court Gives Green Light to Death Penalty Fast-Tracking |work=ABC News |url=https://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory/court-green-light-death-penalty-fast-tracking-37886309 |publisher= abcnews.go.com |access-date=March 24, 2016}}

If the federal court refuses to issue a writ of habeas corpus, the death sentence ordinarily becomes final for all purposes. In recent times, however, prisoners have postponed execution through another avenue of federal litigation; the Civil Rights Act of 1871 – codified at {{usc|42|1983}} – allows complainants to bring lawsuits against state actors to protect their federal constitutional and statutory rights.

While direct appeals are normally limited to just one and automatically stay the execution of the death sentence, Section 1983 lawsuits are unlimited, but the petitioner will be granted a stay of execution only if the court believes he has a likelihood of success on the merits.{{cite web|url = https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/576/14-7955/ |title = Glossip v. Gross 576 U.S. ___ (2015) |publisher = justia.com |access-date= March 20, 2016}}

Traditionally, Section 1983 was of limited use for a state prisoner under sentence of death because the Supreme Court has held that habeas corpus, not Section 1983, is the only vehicle by which a state prisoner can challenge his judgment of death.{{cite web|url=https://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/93-6188.ZS.html |title=Heck v. Humphrey, 512 U.S. 477 (1994) |publisher=Law.cornell.edu |access-date=December 1, 2011}} In the 2006 Hill v. McDonough case, however, the United States Supreme Court approved the use of Section 1983 as a vehicle for challenging a state's method of execution as cruel and unusual punishment in violation of the Eighth Amendment. The theory is that a prisoner bringing such a challenge is not attacking directly his judgment of death, but rather the means by which that the judgment will be carried out. Therefore, the Supreme Court held in the Hill case that a prisoner can use Section 1983 rather than habeas corpus to bring the lawsuit. Yet, as Clarence Hill's own case shows, lower federal courts have often refused to hear suits challenging methods of execution on the ground that the prisoner brought the claim too late and only for the purposes of delay. Further, the Court's decision in Baze v. Rees, upholding a lethal injection method used by many states, has narrowed the opportunity for relief through Section 1983.

While the execution warrant is issued by the governor in several states, in the vast majority it is a judicial order, issued by a judge or by the state supreme court at the request of the prosecution.

The warrant usually sets an execution day. Some states instead provide a longer period, such as a week-long or 10-day window to carry out the execution. This is designated to avoid issuing a new warrant in case of a last-minute stay of execution that would be vacated only few days or few hours later.{{cite web |title=2014 Georgia Code – § 17-10-34 – Sentence to specify time period for and place of execution |url=http://law.justia.com/codes/georgia/2014/title-17/chapter-10/article-2/section-17-10-34/ |publisher= law.justia.com |access-date=April 3, 2016}}

File:Death sentences United States (new).png

In recent years there has been an average of one death sentence for every 200 murder convictions in the United States.

Alabama has the highest per capita rate of death sentences. This is because Alabama was one of the few states that allowed judges to override a jury recommendation in favor of life imprisonment, a possibility it removed in March 2017.{{cite web |url=http://www.eji.org/deathpenalty |title=Death Penalty |publisher=Equal Justice Initiative |access-date=October 29, 2013 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130823045344/http://eji.org/deathpenalty |archive-date=August 23, 2013 |url-status=dead }}{{cite web|url=http://wrbl.com/2017/04/11/alabama-ends-death-penalty-by-judicial-override/|title=Alabama ends death penalty by judicial override|publisher=Associated Press at WRBL|date=March 11, 2017|access-date=March 13, 2017}}

According to the Death Penalty Information Center, the top three factors determining whether a convict gets a death sentence in a murder case are not aggravating factors, but instead the location the crime occurred (and thus whether it is in the jurisdiction of a prosecutor aggressively using the death penalty), the quality of legal defense, and the race of the victim (murder of white victims being punished more harshly).{{Cite web |date=January 26, 2017 |title=State Of Execution |url=https://think.kera.org/2017/01/26/the-death-penalty/ |access-date=May 14, 2023 |website=Think |language=en-US}}

File:USA-death-row-total-amount-of-inmates-per-state.svg

File:USA-death-row-inmates-per-100-000-people-per-state.svg

The distribution of death sentences among states is loosely proportional to their populations and murder rates. California, which is the most populous state, also has the largest death row, with over 700 inmates. Wyoming, which is the least populous state, has only one condemned man.

But executions are more frequent (and happen more quickly after sentencing) in conservative states. Texas, which is the second most populous state in the Union, carried out over 500 executions during the post-Furman era, more than a third of the national total. California has carried out only 13 executions during the same period, and has carried out none since 2006.{{cite web| last=Lundin|first=Leigh |title=Executed Prisoners in Texas |url=http://criminalbrief.com/?page_id=13627 |work=Last Words |publisher=Criminal Brief |access-date=November 5, 2010 }}{{cite web | date=August 22, 2010 | last=Lundin|first=Leigh |title=Last Words |url=http://criminalbrief.com/?p=13542 |work=Capital Punishment |publisher=Criminal Brief }}{{cite web |title=Facts about the Death Penalty |url=https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/documents/FactSheet.pdf|publisher=Death Penalty Information Center |access-date= April 21, 2017|page=3}}

{{Main|Race and capital punishment in the United States}}

Certain races within the United States are disproportionately incarcerated at higher rates than others. African Americans, who make up only 13.6% of the total population, are disproportionately incarcerated in the prison system compared to white Americans.{{Cite web |title=Racial Demographics |url=https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/death-row/overview/demographics |access-date=December 8, 2022 |website=Death Penalty Information Center |language=en-US}}

File:Racial_Demographic_of_Death_Row_inmates.png File:Racial_Demographic_of_District_Attorney's_in_Death_Penalty_States.png

African Americans make up 41% of death row inmates.{{Cite web |date=December 15, 2022 |title=Death Penalty Information Center Facts about the Death Penalty |url=https://documents.deathpenaltyinfo.org/pdf/FactSheet.pdf |access-date=October 25, 2022 |website=deathpenaltyinfo.org}} African Americans have made up 34% of those actually executed since 1976.{{Cite web |title=U.S. Census Bureau QuickFacts: United States |url=https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/fact/table/US/RHI225221#RHI225221. |access-date=December 16, 2022 |website=www.census.gov |language=en}} Twenty-one white offenders have been executed for the murder of a black person since 1976, compared to the 302 black offenders that have been executed for the murder of a white person during that same period. Most individuals involved in determining the verdict in death penalty cases are white. As of 1998, Chief District Attorneys in counties using the death penalty are 98% white and only 1% are African-American.{{Cite web |title=The Death Penalty in Black and White: Who Lives, Who Dies, Who Decides |url=https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/facts-and-research/dpic-reports/in-depth/the-death-penalty-in-black-and-white-who-lives-who-dies-who-decides |access-date=December 8, 2022 |website=Death Penalty Information Center |language=en-US}} A supporting fact discovered through examinations of racial disparities over the past twenty years concerning race and the death penalty found that in 96% of these reviews, there was "a pattern of either race-of-victim or race-of-defendant discrimination or both." 80% of all capital cases involve white victims, despite white people only making up approximately 50% of murder victims.{{Cite web |title=Race and the Death Penalty |url=https://www.aclu.org/other/race-and-death-penalty |access-date=December 16, 2022 |website=American Civil Liberties Union |language=en}}

With regard to exonerated convicts, 54 percent of people wrongfully convicted and sentenced to death in the United States are black; 64 percent are non-white in general.

63.8% of white death row inmates, 72.8% of black death row inmates, 65.4% of Latino death row inmates, and 63.8% of Native American death row inmates – or approximately 67% of death row inmates overall – have a prior felony conviction.{{Cite web |title=Death Row Inmates - Death Penalty - ProCon.org |url=https://deathpenalty.procon.org/death-row-inmates/ |access-date=December 16, 2022 |website=Death Penalty |language=en-US}} Approximately 13.5% of death row inmates are of Hispanic or Latino descent. In 2019, individuals identified as Hispanic and Latino Americans accounted for 5.5% of homicides.{{cite web|url=http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org/new-resources-hispanics-and-death-penalty|title=Hispanics and the Death Penalty|publisher=Death Penalty Information Center|access-date=February 22, 2016}} The death penalty exhortation rate for Hispanic and Latino Americans is 8.6%.{{Cite web |title=Exonerations by Race |url=https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/policy-issues/innocence/exonerations-by-race |website=Death Penalty Information Center}} Approximately 1.81% of death row inmates are of Asian descent.{{cite web |last1=Fins |first1=Deborah |title=Death Row U.S.A. Spring 2020 |url=https://www.naacpldf.org/wp-content/uploads/DRUSASpring2020.pdf |website=naacp.org |publisher=NAACP Legal Defense and Education Fund Inc |access-date=September 14, 2020}}

The American Civil Liberties Union's Capital Punishment Project (CPP) is an anti-death penalty project that works toward the repeal of the death penalty in the U.S. through advocacy and education.{{Cite web |title=Capital Punishment |url=https://www.aclu.org/issues/capital-punishment |access-date=December 15, 2022 |website=American Civil Liberties Union |language=en-US}} The project highlights the racial discriminatory aspects regarding capital punishment and promotes both abolition and systemic reform of the death penalty through direct representation, strategic litigation, and systemic reform.{{Cite web |title=The ACLU's Capital Punishment Project |url=https://www.aclu.org/other/aclus-capital-punishment-project |access-date=December 15, 2022 |website=American Civil Liberties Union}}

Equal Justice USA is a national organization dedicated to healing, racial equity, and community safety in relation to criminal justice and violence.{{Cite web |title=About Us |url=https://ejusa.org/about-us/ |access-date=December 15, 2022 |website=Equal Justice USA |language=en-US}} Their efforts spread wide and involve fundraising and hosting conventions to support communities of color. The organization is aimed towards people of color who have been disproportionately impacted by the death penalty.{{Cite web |title=Accomplishments |url=https://ejusa.org/about-us/accomplishments/ |access-date=December 15, 2022 |website=Equal Justice USA |language=en-US}} Some of their efforts include advocacy to end the death penalty, which they have helped to abolish in nine states.

The geographic distribution of capital punishment in the United States has a strong correlation with the history of slavery and lynchings. States where slavery was legal before the Civil War also saw high numbers of lynchings after the Civil War and into the 20th century. These states include Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Tennessee.{{Cite journal |last1=Jacobs |first1=David |last2=Carmichael |first2=Jason T. |last3=Kent |first3=Stephanie L. |date=August 2005 |title=Vigilantism, Current Racial Threat, and Death Sentences |url=http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/000312240507000406 |journal=American Sociological Review |language=en |volume=70 |issue=4 |pages=656–677 |doi=10.1177/000312240507000406 |s2cid=54591596 |issn=0003-1224|url-access=subscription }} These states also introduced a criminal justice system with Black Codes, designed to control Black people after slavery was abolished in 1865 following the Emancipation Proclamation, and then officially with the ratification of the 13th Amendment.{{Cite web |last=Brown |first=Mary |title=LibGuides: Mass Incarceration: Understanding Racial Disparities |url=https://westportlibrary.libguides.com/c.php?g=1056673&p=7677201 |access-date=December 16, 2022 |website=westportlibrary.libguides.com |language=en}} These states also have the highest rates of capital punishment sentences and executions today.

Once slaveowners lost full ownership of formerly enslaved African-Americans in 1865, lynchings were increasingly used, both legally under the security of Black Codes and illegally, to maintain white dominance and prevent African-Americans from challenging their subordinate place in society. Because of Black Codes, many African-Americans were sent to jail to participate in slave-like work in a system known as Convict leasing. Others faced capital punishment for alleged crimes, often in the form of lynching. Lynchings were able to be carried out because many positions within southern law enforcement, including state officials, and judges were held by former Confederate soldiers.{{Cite web |title=Jim Crow Laws |url=https://www.history.com/topics/early-20th-century-us/jim-crow-laws |access-date=December 7, 2022 |website=HISTORY |language=en}} Despite the passing of the Reconstruction Act of 1867, which weakened the strength of Black Codes and supported the 14th Amendment, the rate of lynching of African-Americans saw an increase,{{Cite web |title=The Black Codes and Jim Crow Laws {{!}} National Geographic Society |url=https://education.nationalgeographic.org/resource/black-codes-and-jim-crow-laws |access-date=December 7, 2022 |website=education.nationalgeographic.org}} due the formation of the white-supremacist terrorist group, the Ku Klux Klan (K.K.K.), in 1865 by former Confederates during Reconstruction. They carried out many lynchings and terrorist attacks against Black people. After the end of the Reconstruction in 1877, when federal troops were removed from southern states in which they assisted in upholding the 14th Amendment's promises of equal protection, Jim Crow laws began to gain traction which enforced segregation and the oppression of African-Americans. Segregation was legal under the 1896 Supreme Court decision Plessy v. Ferguson until the Civil Rights Act of 1964 made it unconstitutional.

During and following the Civil Rights era, laws were introduced to prevent illegal lynchings by the general public. According to David Rigby and Charles Seguin, the popularity of capital punishment increased as a way for White people to control Black people and instill fear. They argue that the disproportionate number of Black Americans sentenced to death during the 20th century, often wrongfully convicted, shows that capital punishment was used as a way for White people to control Black people in a similar manner to lynching. In 1972, the Supreme Court ruled in Furman v. Georgia that capital punishment was unconstitutional. Rigby and Seguin argue that this led to an increase in the illegal lynchings of African-Americans. In 1976 the Supreme Court decision in Gregg v. Georgia {{Cite web |title=The History of the Death Penalty: A Timeline |url=https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/stories/history-of-the-death-penalty-timeline |access-date=December 7, 2022 |website=Death Penalty Information Center |language=en-US}} upheld the death penalty and overturned Furman v. Georgia. Rigby and Seguin argue that this decision was based on a fear that lynchings by the general public would increase if the death penalty did not remain in place.

Although more than 6,500 lynchings occurred between 1865 and 1950 according to the Equal Justice Initiative, lynching did not become a federal crime until 2022 under the Emmett Till Antilynching Act, which was signed into law by President Joe Biden, over a hundred years after Antilynching legislation was first proposed.{{Cite web |title=More Than a Century After it Was First Proposed, President Biden Signs Historic Law Making Lynching a Federal Crime |url=https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/news/more-than-a-century-after-it-was-first-proposed-president-biden-signs-historic-law-making-lynching-a-federal-crime |access-date=December 15, 2022 |website=Death Penalty Information Center |language=en-US}}

21st century legal scholars, Civil Rights lawyers, and advocates, like Michelle Alexander, often refer to both past and modern police officers and officials of the United States' criminal justice system's as legalized, modern lynch mobs because they have the ability to sentence one to life in prison or with the death penalty under the law but with the jurisdiction of potentially incorporating their personal, racial biases.{{Cite book |last=Alexander |first=Michelle |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=reDzBZ3pXqsC |title=The New Jim Crow |publisher=The New Press |year=2010 |isbn=9781595588197 |location=New York, New York |pages=108–159}} The ability for a Black person to be convicted to death, with the potential that racial bias was used in their sentencing, was upheld during the McCleskey v. Kemp court case in Georgia.{{Cite web |title=McCleskey v. Kemp |url=https://www.oyez.org/cases/1986/84-6811 |access-date=December 16, 2022 |website=Oyez |language=en}} Groups like the NAACP's Legal Defense Fund (LDF) have continuously worked and continue to work on abolishing capital punishment based on its historically racist associations with enslavement and lynching, and also its disproportionate impact on racial minority communities.{{Cite journal |last1=Steiker |first1=Carol S. |last2=Steiker |first2=Jordan M. |date=January 13, 2020 |title=The Rise, Fall, and Afterlife of the Death Penalty in the United States |url=https://www.annualreviews.org/doi/10.1146/annurev-criminol-011518-024721 |journal=Annual Review of Criminology |language=en |volume=3 |issue=1 |pages=299–315 |doi=10.1146/annurev-criminol-011518-024721 |s2cid=214110074 |issn=2572-4568|url-access=subscription }}

Capital punishment is still in force in 27 states, which including the following: Alabama, Arizona, Arkansas, California, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Indiana, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, North Carolina, Ohio, Oklahoma, Oregon, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Wyoming.{{Cite web |title=State by State |url=https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/state-and-federal-info/state-by-state |access-date=December 16, 2022 |website=Death Penalty Information Center |language=en-US}} Of these, Oklahoma, Texas, Delaware, Missouri, and Alabama make up the top five states with the highest rate of executions per capita.{{Cite web |title=State Execution Rates (through 2020) |url=https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/stories/state-execution-rates |access-date=December 8, 2022 |website=Death Penalty Information Center |language=en-US}} However, Texas, Oklahoma, Virginia, Florida, and Missouri are the top five states with the highest number of executions–Texas alone has imposed 570 executions since 1976.

The racial makeup of the people sentenced to death reveals a disproportionate representation of Black people. Consider the following states with the highest execution rates per capita (defined as executions per 100,000 residents):

Capital punishment in Texas: Texas is the state with the highest number of cumulative executions since 1976. Black people make up about 45% of the current death row population in Texas,{{Cite web |title=Texas Death Penalty Facts – TCADP |url=https://tcadp.org/get-informed/texas-death-penalty-facts/#:~:text=According%20to%20TDCJ,%20Black%20individuals,the%20current%20death%20row%20population |access-date=December 8, 2022 |website=tcadp.org}} though only make up about 13% of the state's general population.{{Cite web |title=U.S. Census Bureau QuickFacts: Texas |url=https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/TX |access-date=December 8, 2022 |website=www.census.gov |language=en}}

Capital punishment in Oklahoma: Oklahoma is the state with the second highest number of cumulative executions since 1976. Black people make up 46% of death sentences in Oklahoma County, though only make up 16% of the county's total population.{{Cite web |title=Deeply Rooted: How Racial History Informs Oklahoma's Death Penalty |url=https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/facts-and-research/dpic-reports/dpic-special-reports/deeply-rooted-how-racial-history-informs-oklahomas-death-penalty |access-date=December 8, 2022 |website=Death Penalty Information Center |language=en-US}}

It is also the only state that has four methods of execution, while most others only have one or two methods. These methods of execution include: lethal injection, nitrogen hypoxia, electrocution, and firing squad.

Capital punishment in Alabama: Alabama's death penalty sentences persist as it declines among many other states in the U.S. The state continues to have one of the nation's highest rates of death sentences per capita.{{Cite web |title=Alabama's Death Penalty |url=https://eji.org/issues/alabama-death-penalty/ |access-date=December 8, 2022 |website=Equal Justice Initiative |language=en-US}} As of April 1, 2022, there are currently 80 Black people and 84 white people on death row. Though the Black and white populations are both about half of the total death row population in Alabama, Black people are represented at a disproportionately high number considering they make up only 27% of Alabama's general population.{{Cite web |title=U.S. Census Bureau QuickFacts: Alabama |url=https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/AL |access-date=December 8, 2022 |website=www.census.gov |language=en}}

Capital punishment in Virginia: The death penalty in Virginia came to an end on March 24, 2021, when the state became the first Southern state to abolish the death penalty. Prior to abolition, Virginia had some of the most executions out of any state since 1976, as well as the most executions overall in the pre-Furman v. Georgia era.{{Cite magazine |title=Why It's So Significant Virginia Just Abolished the Death Penalty |url=https://time.com/5937804/virginia-death-penalty-abolished/ |access-date=December 8, 2022 |magazine=Time |language=en}}

{{About|the death penalty within the United States|the relationship between race and crime|Race and crime in the United States}}

Exonerations, in relation to the death penalty, are defined as the absolving of someone from their previous verdict of guilty and sentencing of death. Since January 1, 1973, 108 out of the 200 total exonerations have been African Americans. African Americans account for about 54% of all exonerations. As of 2013, over 140 persons sentenced to death, since 1973, had their convictions overturned or received full pardons.{{cite journal|last=Dwyer-Moss|first=Jessica|date=2013|title=Flawed Forensics and the Death Penalty: Junk Science and Potentially Wrongful Executions|url=https://digitalcommons.law.seattleu.edu/sjsj/vol11/iss2/10|journal=Seattle Journal for Social Justice|volume=11|issue=2|article-number=10|access-date=9 December 2024}}{{rp|p=760}} Eighteen prisoners of them have been exonerated on the basis of DNA evidence{{rp|p=792}} In 2009, the Supreme Court held that there is no constitutional right post-conviction DNA testing for convicted prisoners.{{rp|p=799}} Forty-eight states have post-conviction DNA testing statutes.{{rp|p=799}} However, fewer than half the states have statutes that give inmates time and money for post-conviction DNA testing.{{rp|p=799}} There is widespread public support for such a system.{{rp|p=799}}

During the middle of the 20th century, a period of mass incarceration occurred in the United States.{{Cite web |title=American History, Race, and Prison |url=https://www.vera.org/reimagining-prison-web-report/american-history-race-and-prison |access-date=November 8, 2022 |website=Vera Institute of Justice |language=en-US}} The United States became the country with the highest incarceration rate which caused the prison population to become heavily Black by the 1990s whereas it was mainly only white in previous years. White people accounted for 51% of the prison population while Black people accounted for 47% of the entire prison population during the 1990s.{{Cite web |last=Stephan |first=James |date=1991 |title=Jail Inmates, 1990 |url=https://bjs.ojp.gov/content/pub/pdf/ji90.pdf |access-date=}} Even though Black people made up of around half the jail inhabitants, they only were 12.1% of the United States population and white citizens made up 80.3% of the total population during that time.{{Cite web|url=https://www.iowadatacenter.org/datatables/UnitedStates/usstracehispanic1990.pdf|title=Race and Hispanic Origin in the U.S. and all States: 1990}} The prison population had increased from 196,441 people in 1970 to 1.6 million by 2008. This discrepancy of races in the prison population related to the overall demographics of the United States has to do with the inconsistency of police arrests on citizens. Moving into 2015, Black people still made up only 12.1% of the total population but made up 18% of people who were stopped by police on the road.{{Cite web |last= |first= |title=Visualizing the racial disparities in mass incarceration |url=https://www.prisonpolicy.org/blog/2020/07/27/disparities/ |access-date=December 8, 2022 |language=en}} This led to the increase of disproportionate demographics in local jails and prison systems. By 2018, 592 Black people were in local jails per every 100,000 people and 2,271 Black men were incarcerated in federal prisons per 100,000 people. On the other hand, white people were incarcerated at a rate of 187 per 100,000 people in local jails and white men, at the federal level, were incarcerated at a rate of 392 per 100,000 people. This dramatic increase in Black arrests caused America's prison population to boom, which was all due to this long lasting period of mass incarceration.

Mass incarceration had been increasing and there are many factors sustaining its rise. From over-policing to disproportionately long prison sentences, Black people have been targeted in mass incarceration and as a result, more susceptible to capital punishment.{{Cite web |title=Mass Incarceration: The Cause and Effect on Hunger |url=https://moveforhunger.org/blog/mass-incarceration-cause-and-effect-hunger |access-date=December 16, 2022 |website=moveforhunger.org |language=en}}

With the United States' operation based on the U.S. Constitution, federalism allows the state government to share powers with the federal government.{{Cite web |title=Comparing Federal & State Courts |url=https://www.uscourts.gov/about-federal-courts/court-role-and-structure/comparing-federal-state-courts |access-date=December 16, 2022 |website=United States Courts |language=en}} Under the various capacities, different court cases are heard in the national and state court systems. A defendant can be inflicted with the death penalty if they are found condemned of capital offenses,{{Cite web |title=capital offense |url=https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/capital_offense |access-date=December 16, 2022 |website=LII / Legal Information Institute |language=en}} like first-degree murder, murder with special circumstances, treason, or genocide.{{Cite web |date=November 7, 2014 |title=Sentencing |url=https://www.justice.gov/usao/justice-101/sentencing |access-date=December 7, 2022 |website=www.justice.gov |language=en}} Because capital offenses are criminal cases, the state court systems are responsible to hear the majority of them. The Supreme Court and state courts' discretion in keeping the death penalty option are separate for the most part, if not appealed to the Supreme Court. According to the Legal Information Institute, "it is not necessary that the actual punishment imposed was the death penalty, but rather a capital office is classified as such if the permissible punishment prescribed by the legislature for the offense is the death penalty." After Roper v. Simmons in 2005, the federal court deemed if the defendant was under 18 years old at the time of the crime, they can not be sentenced to death because it violates the 8th Amendment.{{Cite web |title=Roper v. Simmons, 543 U.S. 551 (2005) |url=https://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/543/551/ |access-date=December 16, 2022 |website=Justia Law |language=en}}

{{Main|George Stinney}}

In 1944, 14-year-old African-American George Stinney Jr. was convicted of murdering two white girls. He was the youngest person in the United States to be sentenced to death.{{Cite news |date=December 18, 2014 |title=It took 10 minutes to convict 14-year-old George Stinney Jr. It took 70 years after his execution to exonerate him. |url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2014/12/18/the-rush-job-conviction-of-14-year-old-george-stinney-exonerated-70-years-after-execution/ |access-date=December 13, 2022 |newspaper=The Washington Post |issn=0190-8286}} Stinney was executed by electrocution within 80 days of the murders. In 2014, Stinney's convictions were vacated and he was exonerated on the grounds that his 6th amendment rights had been violated. It was found Stinney's interrogation had included coercion, and an absence of counsel and of parental guidance. Police said that Stinney had confessed, but no signed confession was ever produced.{{Cite web |title=South Carolina Vacates the Conviction of 14-Year-Old Executed in 1944 |url=https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/news/south-carolina-vacates-the-conviction-of-14-year-old-executed-in-1944 |access-date=December 13, 2022 |website=Death Penalty Information Center |language=en-US}} The Judge who overturned the conviction wrote that: "Stinney's appointed counsel made no independent investigation, did not request a change of venue or additional time to prepare the case, he asked little or no questions on cross-examination of the State's witnesses and presented few or no witnesses on behalf of his client based on the length of trial. He failed to file an appeal or a stay of execution." Stinney's sister said in a 2009 affidavit that she was with Stinney on the day of the murders, but she was never called to testify during the trial.

The systemic issue of biased investigation conduct is also seen in the Exonerated Five case. The Exonerated Five is made up of one Latino boy, Raymond Santana, and four black youths, Kevin Richardson, Antron McCray, Yusef Salaam, and Korey Wise.{{Cite web |title=The Central Park Five |url=https://www.history.com/topics/1980s/central-park-five |access-date=December 13, 2022 |website=HISTORY |date=September 23, 2019 |language=en}} They are formerly known as the Central Park Five and the Jogger Case. The boys received mixed convictions for assault, robbery, riot, rape, sexual abuse, and attempted murder of a white woman in 1990.

The boys faced intense, un-recorded interrogations for at least seven hours in the absence of legal counsel, with video confessions following, beside Salaam. Wise additionally had no parent present during questioning and confessing. The five youths later pleaded not guilty and recanted their statements because they were produced under intimidation. Despite no DNA evidence linking any of the boys to the crime scene, they were sentenced to 5 to 15 years. After 12 years, the sole perpetrator, Matias Reyes, confessed to the crime while providing a DNA match to the only DNA selection found at the scene.{{Cite web |last=Margaritoff |first=Marco |date=April 13, 2021 |title=This Serial Rapist Brutalized The 'Central Park Jogger' — But Five Black Teens Were Blamed |url=https://allthatsinteresting.com/matias-reyes |access-date=December 15, 2022 |website=All That's Interesting |language=en-US}} Their false confessions were recognized for inconsistencies and their convictions were vacated in December 2002.{{Cite news |last=Saulny |first=Susan |date=December 20, 2002 |title=Convictions and Charges Voided In '89 Central Park Jogger Attack |language=en-US |work=The New York Times |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2002/12/20/nyregion/convictions-and-charges-voided-in-89-central-park-jogger-attack.html |access-date=December 13, 2022 |issn=0362-4331}} They later sued the state and the city for reparations and received approximately $44 million in a settlement.{{Cite news |last=Harris |first=Aisha |date=May 30, 2019 |title=The Central Park Five: 'We Were Just Baby Boys' |language=en-US |work=The New York Times |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/30/arts/television/when-they-see-us.html |access-date=December 13, 2022 |issn=0362-4331}}

File:Trump_Bring_Back_Death_Penalty_ad_1989.jpg"{{Cite web |date=February 17, 2016 |title=Donald Trump and the Central Park Five: the racially charged rise of a demagogue |url=http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/feb/17/central-park-five-donald-trump-jogger-rape-case-new-york |access-date=December 7, 2022 |website=the Guardian |language=en}} Donald Trump spent $85,000 in submitting the ad across four New York City newspapers.]]

During the 1990 trial, Donald Trump (still a minor celebrity at the time) bought full-page ads voicing his reaction to the Central Park case. In the ad, Donald Trump says the following:

"I want to hate these muggers and murderers. They should be forced to suffer and, when they kill, they should be executed for their crimes. They must serve as examples so that others will think long and hard before committing a crime or an act of violence."{{Cite web |last1=Q22686 |last2=Viaf: 49272447 |last3=Isni: 0000 0001 0898 6765 |last4=Ulan: 500082105 |last5=n85387872 |first5=LCCN |last6=Nla: 35123886 |last7=WorldCat |title=File:Trump Bring Back Death Penalty ad 1989.jpg - Wikipedia |url=https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Trump_Bring_Back_Death_Penalty_ad_1989.jpg |access-date=December 7, 2022 |website=commons.wikimedia.org |date=May 1989 |language=en}}

The youths ranged from the ages of 14–16 years when the ad was released. In an archival interview with Larry King, Trump feels his belief is a common feeling because he received 15,000 letters of praise following the ad.{{Cite web |last=Sarlin |first=Andrew Kaczynski, Jon |date=October 7, 2016 |title=Trump in 1989 Central Park Five interview: "Maybe hate is what we need" {{!}} CNN Politics |url=https://www.cnn.com/2016/10/07/politics/trump-larry-king-central-park-five/index.html |access-date=December 7, 2022 |website=CNN |language=en}} In retrospect, Salaam reflects in a 2021 interview with PBS MetroFocus, saying:

"I look at what Donald Trump as being the nails that sealed us in the coffin. And then what happened after that, they published our names, our addresses, and phone numbers in the New York City newspapers. When you think about Donald Trump’s ad, it was a whisper into society to have someone come to our homes to drag us from our beds, and to do to us what they had done to Emmett Till."{{Cite web |last=Franklin |first=Jane |date=May 26, 2021 |title=Yusef Salaam on exoneration, prison reform & racial justice |url=https://www.pbs.org/wnet/chasing-the-dream/stories/central-park-5-yusef-salaam/ |access-date=December 7, 2022 |website=Chasing the Dream |language=en-US}}

Because the youths were minors, their identities were supposed to remain confidential. Salaam shares that his family received an insurgence of death threats following Trump's advertisement, culminating in a climate of aggressive hate. A Central Park Five representative comments that Trump's ad influenced public opinion, possibly further tainting the impartiality of potential jurors "who [already], had a natural affinity for the victim."

As of 2024, Donald Trump has refused to apologize and retract his statements despite the exoneration of the men.{{Cite web |author=Al Jazeera Staff |title=Why are the Central Park Five suing Donald Trump? |url=https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2024/10/22/why-are-the-central-park-five-suing-donald-trump |access-date=2024-12-24 |website=Al Jazeera |language=en}}

Lena Baker was a Black woman who was wrongfully convicted of the murder of her abuser in 1945.{{Cite web |title=Lena Baker Case |url=https://www.georgiaencyclopedia.org/articles/history-archaeology/lena-baker-case/ |access-date=December 13, 2022 |website=New Georgia Encyclopedia |language=en-US}} In Georgia, Baker served as a maid for a handicapped white man; she faced regular sexual and physical abuse from him. Despite the town terrorizing Baker to leave the relationship, her abuser would equally threaten her with violence if she ever left.{{Cite web |title=Lena Baker is Executed |url=https://aaregistry.org/story/lena-baker-executed/ |access-date=December 13, 2022 |website=African American Registry |language=en}} Weeks before his death, he started holding Baker prisoner in his gristmill for numerous days. Baker was able to escape the mill, but when she came back, her abuser threatened her with an iron bar. After a struggle, Baker took ahold of his pistol and shot the man in self-defense.

The all-white, all-male jury did not empathize with Baker's case of self-defense as a survivor of her slave-like conditions, including sexual and physical abuse.{{Cite web |title=The Black Commentator - The Lena Baker Story: Execution in a small town - Issue 40 |url=https://blackcommentator.com/40/40_guest_commentary.html |access-date=December 13, 2022 |website=blackcommentator.com}} In less than a day, the jury found Baker guilty of capital murder, which happened to result in a mandatory death sentence in Georgia at the time. After failed appeals, reviews, and the abandonment of her legal representation, Lena Baker was executed by electrocution in 1945. About 60 years following Baker's death, her family, with the help of the Prison and Jail Project, requested a posthumous pardon.{{Cite web |date=January 3, 2011 |title=In Honor of Lena Baker (Posthumously) |url=https://bishop.house.gov/media-center/congressional-record-statements/in-honor-of-lena-baker-posthumously |access-date=December 13, 2022 |website=Congressman Sanford Bishop |language=en |archive-date=August 31, 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190831234209/https://bishop.house.gov/media-center/congressional-record-statements/in-honor-of-lena-baker-posthumously |url-status=dead }} Their efforts succeeded in 2005 when Baker was granted a full and unconditional pardon from the Georgia Board of Pardons and Paroles because there was a lack of evidence to demonstrate Baker's intent to kill. If the justice system had been careful with the evidence, they would have noted Baker's conviction did not qualify as capital murder and should have resulted in a sentence other than the death penalty.

As of May 20, 2021, the Death Penalty Information Center reports that there are 51 women on death row. 17 women have been executed since 1976,{{cite web|url=https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/women-and-death-penalty|title=Women and the Death Penalty {{!}} Death Penalty Information Center|website=deathpenaltyinfo.org|language=en|access-date=November 8, 2017}} compared to 1,516 men during the same time period.{{Cite web|url=https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/documents/FactSheet.pdf|title=Facts About the Death Penalty}}

Since 1608, 15,391 lawful executions are confirmed to have been carried out in jurisdictions of, or now of, the United States, of these, 575, or 3.6%, were women. Women account for {{frac|1|50}} death sentences, {{frac|1|67}} people on death row, and {{frac|1|100}} people whose executions are actually carried out. While always comparatively rare, women are significantly less likely to be executed in the modern era than in the past. Of the 16 women executed on the state level, most took place in either Texas (6), Oklahoma (3) or Florida (2) and were demographically, 25% (4) African-American and 75% (12) being White of any ethnicity. Historically, the states that have executed the most women are California, Texas and Florida, though unlike Texas and Florida, California has not executed a woman in the post-Furman era. The racial breakdown of women sentenced to death is 61% white, 21% black, 13% Latina, 3% Asian, and 2% American Indian.

[[File:Map of use of lethal injection in the United States.svg|alt=|thumb|250x250px|Usage of lethal injection in the US:

{{legend|#CC6633;|State uses only this method.}}

{{legend|#FF9900;|State uses this method primarily but also has other methods.}}

{{legend|#ffdd55ff;|State uses this method as a secondary method.}}

{{legend|#7fff00;|State once used this method, but does not now.}}

{{legend|#0048BA;|State once adopted this method, but dropped before its use.}}

{{legend|#0099CC;|State has never adopted this method.}}]]

[[File:Map of US firing squad usage.svg|thumb|left|Firing squad usage in the United States:

{{legend|#FFFF33;|State uses this as a secondary method.}}

{{legend|#7fff00;|State once used this method, but no longer does.}}

{{legend|#0099CC;|State has never used this method.}}]]

File:Methods of executions in the United States.PNG, most states changed to lethal injection, leading to its rise.]]

Of the 27 states with the death penalty, 23 provide lethal injection either as the sole method of execution, or as the primary method applying by default (if available) when the convict does not select one.{{cite web |title= Methods of Execution |url= http://www.clarkprosecutor.org/html/death/methods.htm |publisher= clarkprosecutor.org | access-date=March 28, 2016}}{{cite web|url=http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org/methods-execution|title=Methods of Execution|publisher=deathpenaltyinfo.org|access-date=June 14, 2020}}

The four other states include South Carolina, which provides electrocution as the primary method,{{cite web|title=South Carolina Supreme Court Hears Arguments on Constitutionality of Electrocution and Firing Squad, Considers Scope of Secrecy Law|url=https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/south-carolina-supreme-court-hears-arguments-on-constitutionality-of-electrocution-and-firing-squad-considers-scope-of-secrecy-law|publisher=Death Penalty Information Center|access-date=September 10, 2024}} while Louisiana, Mississippi and Missouri allow the department of corrections to select the method.

Several states continue to use the three-drug protocol for lethal injection: firstly an anesthetic, secondly pancuronium bromide, a paralytic, and finally potassium chloride to stop the heart.{{cite web|title=State by State Lethal Injection|url=http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org/state-lethal-injection|publisher=Death Penalty Information Center|access-date=May 14, 2016}} Eight states have used a single-drug protocol, instead using a single anesthetic.

While some state statutes specify the drugs required in executions, a majority does not.

File:Map of US electric chair usage.svg

File:Map of US gas chamber usage.svg

Pressures from anti-death penalty activists have led to supply-chain disruptions of the chemicals used in lethal injections. Hospira, the only U.S. manufacturer of sodium thiopental, stopped making the drug in 2011, citing "[Hospira] would have to prove that it wouldn’t be used in capital punishment."{{cite web |last=Richmond |first=Ben |date=October 28, 2013 |title=Will the EU kill America's Death Penalty? |url=https://www.vice.com/en/article/will-the-eu-kill-americas-death-penalty/ |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131102084023/http://motherboard.vice.com/blog/will-the-eu-kill-americas-death-penalty |archive-date=November 2, 2013 |access-date=November 5, 2013 |website=Motherboard |url-status=live |publisher=Vice Media, Inc.}} In 2016, it was reported that more than 20 U.S. and European drug manufacturers including Pfizer (the owner of Hospira) had taken steps to prevent their drugs from being used for lethal injections.{{Cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2016/05/14/us/pfizer-execution-drugs-lethal-injection.html|title=Pfizer Blocks the Use of Its Drugs in Executions|last=Eckholm|first=Erik|date=May 13, 2016|newspaper=The New York Times|issn=0362-4331|access-date=May 14, 2016}}{{cite news |url=https://newrepublic.com/article/115284/big-pharma-may-end-death-penalty |title=Big Pharma May Help End The Death Penalty |newspaper=The New Republic |last=Algar |first=Clare |date=October 22, 2013 |access-date=November 5, 2013}}

Since then, some states have used other anesthetics, such as pentobarbital, etomidate,{{cite news|work=The Washington Post|url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2017/08/24/a-death-penalty-first-for-florida-executing-a-white-man-for-killing-a-black-man/|title=A death penalty landmark for Florida: Executing a white man for killing a black man|date=August 24, 2017|last=Mettler|first=Katie}} or fast-acting benzodiazepines or sedatives like midazolam.{{Cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/30/us/supreme-court-execution-drug.html|title=Supreme Court Allows Use of Execution Drug|last=Liptak|first=Adam|date=June 29, 2015|newspaper=The New York Times|issn=0362-4331|access-date=October 5, 2016}} In 2009, following the failed execution of Romell Broom, Ohio began using a one drug protocol of thiopental sodium intravenously for lethal injections, or an intramuscular injection of midazolam and hydromorphone if an IV site could not be established.{{cite web | url=http://www.drc.ohio.gov/public/press/press342.htm | title=Ohio Prisons Director Announces Changes to Ohio's Execution Process | date=November 13, 2009 | publisher=Ohio Department of Rehabilitation and Correction | access-date=January 17, 2014 | url-status=dead | archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130115131421/http://www.drc.ohio.gov/Public/press/press342.htm | archive-date=January 15, 2013 }}{{cite news| url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-28457460 |title=Arizona execution takes two hours| date= July 24, 2014 | work= BBC News | access-date=July 24, 2014 }}

Many states have since bought lethal injection drugs from foreign suppliers, and most states have made it a criminal offense to reveal the identities of drug suppliers or execution team members.{{cite web |title= Secret Execution Team, Firing Squads, Restricted Media Included in House Bill |url=http://www.jacksonfreepress.com/news/2016/mar/28/secret-execution-team-firing-squads-restricted-med/ |publisher= jacksonfreepress.com |access-date=April 6, 2016}} In November 2015, California adopted regulations allowing the state to use its own public compounding pharmacies to make the chemicals.{{cite web |title= Notice of change to regulations |url= http://www.cdcr.ca.gov/Regulations/Adult_Operations/docs/NCDR/2015NCR/15-10/NCR%2015-10%20Notice%20of%20Proposed%20Regulations.pdf |publisher= cdcr.ca.gov |access-date= May 22, 2016 |archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20160115033513/http://www.cdcr.ca.gov/Regulations/Adult_Operations/docs/NCDR/2015NCR/15-10/NCR%2015-10%20Notice%20of%20Proposed%20Regulations.pdf |archive-date= January 15, 2016 |url-status= dead }}

Lethal injection was held to be a constitutional method of execution by the U.S. Supreme Court in three cases: Baze v. Rees (2008), Glossip v. Gross (2015), and Bucklew v. Precythe (2019).{{cite news|title= High court upholds lethal injection method|url=http://edition.cnn.com/2008/CRIME/04/16/scotus.injections/index.html|access-date=June 30, 2017|work=Cable News Network (CNN)|date= April 16, 2008}}{{cite news|title= Supreme Court backs use of lethal injection drug |url=https://edition.cnn.com/2015/06/29/politics/supreme-court-lethal-injection-ruling/index.html|access-date=June 30, 2017|work=Cable News Network (CNN)|date=June 29, 2015}}

In the following states, the method is selected by the department of corrections among:

• Lethal injection and gas chamber in Missouri{{cite web |title= §546.720. Death penalty - manner of execution - execution team to be selected, members, confidentiality.|url=https://law.justia.com/codes/missouri/title-xxxvii/chapter-546/section-546-720/ |publisher= law.justia.com |access-date=February 21, 2025}}See also: Bucklew v. Precythe, 587 U.S. 119 (2019)
• Lethal injection, nitrogen hypoxia and electrocution in Louisiana{{cite web |title= §15:569 Place for execution of death sentence; manner of execution|url=https://law.justia.com/codes/louisiana/revised-statutes/title-15/rs-15-569/ |publisher= law.justia.com |access-date=February 21, 2025}}{{cite news|last=Finn|first=James|date=March 5, 2024|title=Jeff Landry signs bills to expand Louisiana death penalty, eliminate parole|work=The Times-Picayune/The New Orleans Advocate|url=https://www.nola.com/news/politics/legislature/jeff-landry-signs-bill-to-expand-louisiana-death-penalty/article_9b33b116-da5d-11ee-a325-3f26b93ed77e.html|access-date=March 6, 2024|archive-url=https://archive.today/20240306125537/https://www.nola.com/news/politics/legislature/jeff-landry-signs-bill-to-expand-louisiana-death-penalty/article_9b33b116-da5d-11ee-a325-3f26b93ed77e.html|archive-date=March 6, 2024|url-status=live}}
• Lethal injection, nitrogen hypoxia, electrocution and firing squad in Mississippi{{cite web |title= §99-19-51 Manner of execution of death sentence; execution team; confidentiality of identities of State Executioner and his or her deputies, members of execution team, supplier of lethal injection chemicals and witnesses listed in Section 99-19-55|url=https://law.justia.com/codes/mississippi/title-99/chapter-19/in-general/section-99-19-51/ |publisher= law.justia.com |access-date=February 21, 2025}}

In the following states, death row inmates with an execution warrant may choose to be executed by a way other than the state default-method:

• Nitrogen hypoxia in Alabama
• Gas chamber in California
• Electrocution in Alabama and Florida
• Lethal injection or firing squad in South Carolina

In four states an alternate method (firing squad in Utah, gas chamber in Arizona, and electrocution in Arkansas, Kentucky and Tennessee) is possible only when the inmate was sentenced to death for crimes committed prior to a specified date (usually when the state switched from the earlier method to lethal injection).{{efn|In states that abolished death penalty, people sentenced to death for a crime before the date of the abolition may retroactively be subjected to death penalty. Those states' methods are:

• lethal injection in Colorado
• lethal injection in New Hampshire, unless this method is "impractical", in which case hanging would be the method
• lethal injection or electrocution in Virginia, at the election of the offender}}

The most recent executions by methods other than injection are as follows (all chosen by the inmate):

Depending on the state, the following alternative methods are statutorily provided in case lethal injection is either found unconstitutional by a court or unavailable for practical reasons:South Carolina Code of Laws: {{cite web |title= Section 24-3-530. Death by electrocution or lethal injection. |url= http://law.justia.com/codes/south-carolina/2015/title-24/chapter-3/section-24-3-530/ |publisher= law.justia.com |access-date= June 4, 2016}}

• Nitrogen hypoxia in Alabama and Oklahoma
• Gas chamber in California and Wyoming
• Electrocution in Arkansas, Florida, Kentucky,{{cite web |title= Method of execution in event of unconstitutionality of KRS 431.220 |url= https://codes.findlaw.com/ky/title-xl-crimes-and-punishments/ky-rev-st-sect-431-223.html |publisher= codes.findlaw.com |access-date= March 22, 2020}} Oklahoma and Tennessee
• Firing squad in Idaho, Oklahoma, South Carolina and Utah
• Hanging in New Hampshire (where repeal of the death penalty in 2019 is not retroactive, and the state still has one death row inmate)

Several states including Oklahoma, Tennessee and Utah, have added back-up methods recently (or have expanded their application fields) in reaction to the shortage of lethal injection drugs.{{cite web|title=How to kill: America's death penalty dilemma|date=March 24, 2016 |url=https://edition.cnn.com/2016/03/24/us/state-of-death-penalty-in-graphs-and-charts/|publisher= cnn.com|access-date=March 28, 2016}}

Some states such as Alabama, Florida and Tennessee have a larger provision dealing with execution methods unavailability, requiring their state departments of corrections to use "any constitutional method" if both lethal injection and electrocution are found unconstitutional. This was designed to make unnecessary any further legislative intervention in that event, but the provision applies only to legal (not practical) infeasibility.{{cite web|title=922.105 – Execution of death sentence|url=http://www.leg.state.fl.us/statutes/index.cfm?App_mode=Display_Statute&Search_String=&URL=0900-0999/0922/Sections/0922.105.html|publisher=leg.state.fl.us|access-date=March 28, 2016}}{{cite web|title=40-23-114 – Death by lethal injection Election of electrocution.|url=http://law.justia.com/codes/tennessee/2010/title-40/chapter-23/40-23-114/|publisher=law.justia.com|access-date=March 30, 2016}}{{cite web|title=§15-18-82.1 Methods of Execution; Election of Method; Constitutionality.|url=https://law.justia.com/codes/alabama/title-15/chapter-18/article-5/section-15-18-82-1/|publisher=law.justia.com|access-date=February 21, 2025}}

Oklahoma became in 2015 the first state to have adopted the nitrogen option.{{cite magazine|title=The Dawn of a New Form of Capital Punishment|url=https://time.com/3749879/nitrogen-gas-execution-oklahoma-lethal-injection/|magazine=Time|date=April 17, 2015}} After struggling for years to design a nitrogen execution protocol and to obtain a proper device for it, Oklahoma announced in February 2020 it abandoned the project after finding a new reliable source of lethal injection drugs and has since resumed executions.{{cite web|title=Oklahoma Attorney general says state will resume executions|date=February 13, 2020|url=https://nypost.com/2020/02/13/oklahoma-attorney-general-says-state-will-resume-executions/|publisher=nypost.com|access-date=March 22, 2020}}

In March 2018, Alabama became the third state (after Oklahoma and Mississippi) to make nitrogen hypoxia available,{{cite web|url=https://apnews.com/9d8ea52c7fa242b7b98a060709380698|title =Alabama 3rd state to allow execution by nitrogen gas|website=Associated Press|date=March 22, 2018}} and became the first when it successfully executed Kenneth Eugene Smith at William C. Holman Correctional Facility.{{Cite news |last=Bogel-Burroughs |first=Nicholas |date=2024-02-01 |title=A Select Few Witnessed Alabama's Nitrogen Execution. This Is What They Saw. |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2024/02/01/us/alabama-nitrogen-execution-kenneth-smith-witnesses.html |access-date=2024-02-04 |work=The New York Times |language=en-US |issn=0362-4331}}

The method of execution of federal prisoners for offenses under the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994 is that of the state in which the conviction took place. If the state has no death penalty, the judge must choose a state with the death penalty for carrying out the execution.

The federal government has a facility (at U.S. Penitentiary Terre Haute) and regulations only for executions by lethal injection, but the United States Code allows U.S. Marshals to use state facilities and employees for federal executions.{{cite web |url= https://www.law.cornell.edu/cfr/text/28/26.3 |title= § 26.3 Date, time, place, and method of execution. |publisher= law.cornell.edu |access-date= March 15, 2017}}{{cite web |url= https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/3597 |title= 18 U.S. Code § 3597 – Use of State facilities |publisher= law.cornell.edu |access-date= March 15, 2017}}

The method of execution for death sentences imposed by military courts is lethal injection,{{cite web|last=Browne|first=Ryan|url=http://www.cnn.com/2016/12/28/politics/us-military-execution/index.html|title=US military could carry out first execution in over 50 years|publisher=CNN|date=2016-12-28|access-date=2025-02-21}} and the Bureau of Prisons agreed to let the U.S. Armed Forces use its civilian facility for that purpose.{{cite web|url=https://www.nbcnews.com/id/wbna27828874|title=Military sets date for first execution since 1961|agency=Associated Press|date=2008-11-20|df=mdy-all|website=NBC News|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140104015153/http://www.nbcnews.com/id/27828874/ns/us_news-military/t/military-sets-date-first-execution/|archive-date=2014-01-04|url-status=live|access-date=2025-02-21}}

File:TimothyMcVeighPerryOKApr2195.jpg were mostly survivors and victims' relatives of the Oklahoma City bombing.]]

The last public execution in the U.S. was that of Roscoe Jackson in Galena, Missouri, on May 21, 1937.{{Cite news |date=May 21, 1937 |title=Firm Walk to Gallows; Dudley Barr Smiles as Arms Are Strapped to His Sides |url=https://www.newspapers.com/article/the-kansas-city-star-firm-walk-to-gallow/150440549/ |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20240701182143/https://www.newspapers.com/article/the-kansas-city-star-firm-walk-to-gallow/150440549/ |archive-date=July 1, 2024 |access-date=July 1, 2024 |work=Kansas City Star |pages=1 |via=Newspapers.com}}

It was the last execution in the nation at which the general public was permitted to attend without any legally imposed restrictions. "Public execution" is a legal phrase, defined by the laws of various states, and carried out pursuant to a court order. Similar to "public record" or "public meeting", it means that anyone who wants to attend the execution may do so.

Around 1890, a political movement developed in the United States to mandate private executions. Several states enacted laws which required executions to be conducted within a "wall" or "enclosure", or to "exclude public view". Most state laws currently use such explicit wording to prohibit public executions, while others do so only implicitly by enumerating the only authorized witnesses.{{cite web|url=http://cfr.vlex.com/vid/26-4-other-execution-procedures-19676580|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140118085043/http://cfr.vlex.com/vid/26-4-other-execution-procedures-19676580|url-status=dead|title=Federal regulations 28 CFR 26.4|archive-date=January 18, 2014}}

All states allow news reporters to be execution witnesses for information of the general public, except Wyoming which allows only witnesses authorized by the condemned.{{cite web|title = Texas Execution Information – Texas Execution Primer|url = http://www.txexecutions.org/primer.asp|website = www.txexecutions.org|access-date = August 5, 2015}}{{cite web |title = States go hunting for execution witnesses |url = http://orig.jacksonsun.com/fe/exec/witnesses.shtml |website = jacksonsun.com |access-date = July 15, 2017 }}{{Dead link|date=August 2023 |bot=InternetArchiveBot |fix-attempted=yes }}{{cite web|title = Wyoming Code § 7-13-908 |url =http://law.justia.com/codes/wyoming/2016/title-7/chapter-13/article-9/section-7-13-908/ |website = law.justia.com |access-date = July 15, 2017}}

Several states also allow victims' families and relatives selected by the prisoner to watch executions. An hour or two before the execution, the condemned is offered religious services and to choose their last meal (except in Texas which abolished it in 2011).

The execution of Timothy McVeigh on June 11, 2001, was witnessed by over 200 people, most by closed-circuit television. Most were survivors, or relatives of victims of, the 1995 Oklahoma City Bombing, for which McVeigh had been sentenced to death.

Gallup, Inc. has monitored support for the death penalty in the United States since 1937. Gallup surveys documented a sharp increase in support for capital punishment between 1966 (42%) and 1994 (80%).{{cite web |title= In Depth: Topics A to Z - Death Penalty |url=https://news.gallup.com/poll/1606/death-penalty.aspx |website= news.gallup.com |date= 2024 |access-date=November 26, 2024}} In the late 1990s, support began to wane,{{cite book |last1=Baumgartner. De Boef, Boydstun |first1=Frank, Suzanna, Amber |title=The Decline of the Death Penalty and the Discovery of Innocence |date=2011 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |isbn=978-0521715249 |location=Cambridge}} falling to 53% in a 2024 telephone calls survey.{{cite journal|title=Persuasion and Resistance: Race and the Death Penalty in America|first1=Mark|last1=Peffley|first2=Jon|last2=Hurwitz|date=October 1, 2007|journal=American Journal of Political Science|volume=51|issue=4|pages = 996–1012|doi=10.1111/j.1540-5907.2007.00293.x}}

Pew Research polls have measured in 2020 support for the death penalty to be 65% when a panel responds to a self-administered online survey, and 52% when asked by live telephone interviewers.{{cite web |first= Giovanni |last= Russonello |title= How Many Americans Support the Death Penalty? Depends How You Ask. |url= https://www.nytimes.com/2021/06/02/us/politics/death-penalty-polls.html |website= www.nytimes.com |date= 2021 |access-date=August 24, 2024}}{{cite web |author= Andrew Daniller and Jocelyn Kiley |title= Death penalty draws more Americans' support online than in telephone surveys |url= https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2021/06/02/death-penalty-draws-more-americans-support-online-than-in-telephone-surveys/ |website= pewresearch.org |date= 2021 |access-date=August 24, 2024}} The gap between the two methods was wider for Democratic-leaning voters, with 32% of them approving capital punishment by phone and 49% online, compared to a difference of 74% versus 83% for Republican-leaning voters.

In 2021, Ipsos conducted a multinational online survey on capital punishment among 55 countries. It showed 67% of Americans favoring the death penalty, more than any European Union country, but lower than Japan and South Korea.{{cite web |title= Freedoms at risk: The challenge of the century - A global survey on democracy in 55 countries |url= https://community-democracies.org/app/uploads/2022/01/fondapol-IRI-CoD-KAS-Genron-FNG-Rda-survey-freedoms-at-risk-the-challenge-of-the-century-01-2022.pdf |page=77 |website= community-democracies.org |date= 2021 |access-date=August 29, 2024}}

Support levels vary depending on the question's wording.{{cite web |title=Facts & Research - Public Opinion |url= https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/facts-and-research/public-opinion-polls |website= deathpenaltyinfo.org |quote=What Americans say about the death penalty depends upon the question they are asked. |date=2024 |access-date=August 24, 2024}} When asked in 2019 by Gallup to choose between the following two approaches, which do they think is the better penalty for murder, 36% of polled persons selected the death penalty, and 60% life imprisonment with absolutely no possibility of parole.{{cite web |title=Facts & Research - Public Opinion |url= https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/facts-and-research/public-opinion-polls |website= deathpenaltyinfo.org |quote=Over the years, support for alternatives to the death penalty has risen to the point where 60% of respondents told Gallup in 2019 that they believe life without parole (LWOP) is more appropriate than the death penalty as the punishment for murder. 36% said they favored the death penalty. In state polling, support for capital punishment dropped even further when additional alternatives such as life with parole eligibility or a long prison term were added to the question. |date=2024 |access-date=August 24, 2024}} This was the highest percentage received by life without parole since the first time the question was asked in 1985.

A 2019 study for the Rose Institute of State and Local Government surveyed respondents online about specific crimes. The two receiving the highest support for a capital sentence were raping and murdering a child (80%) and killing dozens of people as part of a terrorist attack (75%). The two that received the lowest support were killing someone after breaking into their home (52%) and killing someone in the course of a robbery (49%).{{cite web |title= How Many Americans Support the Death Penalty? |url= https://s10294.pcdn.co/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/HMASDP-June-8-2021.pdf |page=8 |website= s10294.pcdn.co |date= 2021 |access-date=August 24, 2024}}

{{main|Capital punishment debate in the United States}}

Amnesty International opposes capital punishment because it breaches human rights, in particular the right to life and the right to live free from torture or cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.{{Cite web|title=Death Penalty|url=https://www.amnesty.org/en/what-we-do/death-penalty/|author=|publisher=Amnesty International|access-date=28 December 2024}} Other groups oppose capital punishment on moral grounds.

Some law enforcement organizations, and some victims' rights groups support capital punishment.

The United States is one of the four developed countries that still practice capital punishment, along with Japan, Singapore, and Taiwan.

Religious groups are widely split on the issue of capital punishment.{{cite web|url=http://www.religioustolerance.org/execut7.htm |title=ReligiousTolerance |publisher=ReligiousTolerance |access-date=December 1, 2011}} The Fiqh Council of North America, a group of Muslim scholars in the United States, has issued a fatwa calling for a moratorium on capital punishment in the United States until various preconditions in the legal system are met.{{cite web |url=http://www.fiqhcouncil.org/Articles/GeneralFiqhIssues/tabid/170/ctl/Detail/mid/569/xmid/4/xmfid/1/Default.aspx |title=Archived copy |access-date=March 3, 2010 |archive-date=August 15, 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210815163407/http://www.fiqhcouncil.org/Articles/GeneralFiqhIssues/tabid/170/ctl/Detail/mid/569/xmid/4/xmfid/1/Default.aspx |url-status=dead }}

Reform Judaism has formally opposed the death penalty since 1959, when the Union of American Hebrew Congregations (now the Union for Reform Judaism) resolved "that in the light of modern scientific knowledge and concepts of humanity, the resort to or continuation of capital punishment either by a state or by the national government is no longer morally justifiable."{{cite web|url=https://reformjudaism.org/social-justice-advocacy/jewish-views/civil-rights/why-reform-judaism-opposes-death-penalty|title=Why Reform Judaism Opposes the Death Penalty|last=Hirt-Manheimer|first=Aron|publisher=Union for Reform Judaism|date=January 7, 2019|access-date=28 December 2024}} The resolution goes on to say that the death penalty "lies as a stain upon civilization and our religious conscience." In 1979, the Central Conference of American Rabbis, the professional arm of the Reform rabbinate, resolved that, "both in concept and in practice, Jewish tradition found capital punishment repugnant" and there is no persuasive evidence "that capital punishment serves as a deterrent to crime."

In October 2009, the American Law Institute voted to disavow the framework for capital punishment that it had created in 1962, as part of the Model Penal Code, "in light of the current intractable institutional and structural obstacles to ensuring a minimally adequate system for administering capital punishment". A study commissioned by the institute had said that experience had proved that the goal of individualized decisions about who should be executed and the goal of systemic fairness for minorities and others could not be reconciled.{{Cite news|work=The New York Times |last=Lipak |first=Adam |date=January 4, 2010 |title=Group Gives Up Death Penalty Work |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/05/us/05bar.html}} {{As of|2017}}, 159 prisoners have been exonerated due to evidence of their innocence.{{rp|p=760}}{{cite web|title=Facts about the Death Penalty|url=http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org/documents/FactSheet.pdf|publisher=Death Penalty Information Center|access-date=December 23, 2015|date=December 9, 2015}}{{cite web|url=http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org/innocence-list-those-freed-death-row|title=Innocence: List of Those Freed From Death Row|date=October 28, 2010|access-date=March 11, 2011|publisher=Death Penalty Information Center}}

Advocates of the death penalty say that it deters crime, is a good tool for prosecutors in plea bargaining,{{cite journal|url=http://wweek.com/editorial/3411/10288/ |title=Killing Time Dead Men Waiting on Oregon's Death Row |first=James |last=Pitkin |periodical=Willamette Week |date=January 23, 2008 |access-date=March 11, 2011 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080124040746/http://wweek.com/editorial/3411/10288/ |archive-date=January 24, 2008 }} improves the community by eliminating recidivism by executed criminals, provides "closure" to surviving victims or loved ones, and is a just penalty. Some advocates{{who|date=May 2022}} against the death penalty argue that "most of the rest of the world gave up on human sacrifice a long time ago."{{cite web |last1=Peacock |first1=John |url=https://www.metafilter.com/161691/Jeffrey-Wood#6672735 |title=Jeffrey Wood |publisher=Metafilter |access-date=June 3, 2020}}

The murder rate is highest in the South (6.5 per 100,000 in 2016), where 80% of executions are carried out, and lowest in the Northeast (3.5 per 100,000), with less than 1% of executions. A report by the US National Research Council in 2012 stated that studies claiming a deterrent effect are "fundamentally flawed" and should not be used for policy decisions. According to a survey of the former and present presidents of the country's top academic criminological societies, 88% of these experts rejected the notion that the death penalty acts as a deterrent to murder.

Data shows that the application of the death penalty is strongly influenced by racial bias. In McCleskey v. Kemp, the United States supreme court acknowledged a "racially disproportionate impact" of capital punishment, but ultimately ruled that this was not enough to mitigate specific death penalty verdicts.{{cite journal|last=Londono|first=O.|date=March 5, 2013|title=A Retributive Critique of Racial Bias and Arbitrariness in Capital Punishment|journal=Journal of Social Philosophy|volume=44|number=1|pages=95–105|doi=10.1111/josp.12013|doi-access=free}} Another argument in the capital punishment debate is the cost.{{cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2009/03/01/opinion/l01death.html |title=Letter – Cost of the Death Penalty |location=California |work=The New York Times |date=February 28, 2009 |access-date=December 1, 2011}}

Opponents to the death penalty note that the lethal injection, the most common method of carrying out the death penalty, can oftentimes cause executed individuals to remain conscious for several minutes after administering the injection, causing them to feel severe pain in their veins.{{Cite web |last=Shackford |first=Scott |date=April 22, 2022 |title=Possible Problems With Lethal Injection Drugs Stop Tennessee Execution |url=https://reason.com/2022/04/22/possible-problems-with-lethal-injection-drugs-stop-tennessee-execution/ |access-date=May 14, 2023 |website=Reason.com |language=en-US}} The "three drug cocktail" consists of midazolam, a sedative, vecuronium bromide, a paralytic, and potassium chloride, which stops the heart.{{Cite web |date=October 28, 2021 |title=3-drug cocktail focal point of controversy in Oklahoma's execution of death row inmates |url=https://kfor.com/news/local/controversial-3-drug-cocktail-focal-point-of-controversy-in-oklahomas-execution-of-death-row-inmates/ |access-date=May 14, 2023 |website=KFOR.com Oklahoma City |language=en-US}} Opponents note that the midazolam in particular may mask the executed individual's pain and suffering.{{Cite web |title=The Case Against the Death Penalty |url=https://www.aclu.org/other/case-against-death-penalty |access-date=May 14, 2023 |website=American Civil Liberties Union |language=en}} Opponents argue that this causes unnecessary pain and suffering on the executed individual and constitutes cruel and unusual punishment in violation of the Eighth Amendment to the United States Constitution.

Additionally, in 2021–22, states such as South Carolina have experienced a shortage of the drugs used to make the lethal cocktail and some inmates have had to choose between death by electric chair or death by firing squad (aiming for the heart).{{cite web|url=https://reason.com/2022/04/18/death-by-firing-squad-returns-to-south-carolina/|title=Death by Firing Squad Returns to South Carolina| date=April 18, 2022}} Critics note that these other methods are more likely to induce pain in the inmate during execution{{Cite web |date=March 29, 2016 |title=The shocking truth about the electric chair |url=https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/the-shocking-truth-about-the-electric-chair |access-date=May 14, 2023 |website=Washington Examiner |language=en}} and that these methods of execution have a high risk of being botched.{{cite web |title=Botched Executions |url=https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/executions/botched-executions |access-date=June 2, 2022 |website=Death Penalty Information Center}}

{{Further|Capital punishment#Non-painful execution}}

One of the main arguments against the use of capital punishment in the United States is that there has been a long history of botched executions. University of Colorado Boulder Professor Michael L. Radelet described a "botched execution" as an execution that causes the prisoner to suffer for a long period of time before they die.{{cite web|url=https://www.hrw.org/reports/2006/us0406/8.htm|title=So Long as They Die: Lethal Injections in the United States: VI. Botched Executions|website=www.hrw.org|access-date=April 26, 2018}} This has led to the argument that capital punishment is per se cruel and unusual punishment. The following is a short list of examples of botched executions that have occurred in the United States.

• William Kemmler was the first person executed in the electric chair, in 1890. After being pronounced dead after 17 seconds, he was found to be still alive. The current was applied a second time, for two minutes, to complete the death.{{cite web|url=https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/Botched_Executions_in_American_History|title=Botched Executions in American History|publisher=Death Penalty Information Center|language=en|access-date=May 4, 2018}}
• In Arizona, it took Joseph Wood two hours to die after being injected.{{cite web|last1=Hannon|first1=Elliot|title=Arizona Man Gasps and Snorts During Lethal Injection Execution That Took Nearly Two Hours|url=http://www.slate.com/blogs/the_slatest/2014/07/23/botched_lethal_injection_of_joseph_wood_takes_two_hours.html|work=Slate|access-date=July 24, 2014|date=July 23, 2014}}
• In Alabama, the execution of Doyle Hamm was called off after prison medical staff spent nearly three hours attempting to insert an IV that could be used to administer the lethal injection drugs. In the process, the execution team punctured Hamm's bladder and femoral artery, causing significant bleeding.{{cite news|url=https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2018/feb/26/gory-botched-alabamas-aborted-execution-of-inmate-was-bloody-says-lawyer|title='Gory, botched': Alabama's aborted execution of inmate was bloody, says lawyer|agency=Reuters|date=February 26, 2018|website=The Guardian|language=en|access-date=May 4, 2018}}{{cite web|url=https://theintercept.com/2018/03/03/doyle-hamm-alabama-execution-lethal-injection/|title=Another Failed Execution: the Torture of Doyle Lee Hamm|last=Segura|first=Liliana|date=March 3, 2018|website=The Intercept|language=en-US|access-date=August 9, 2019}}
• In Florida, Jesse Joseph Tafero had flames burst from his hair during an electrocution.{{cite web|url=https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/some-examples-post-furman-botched-executions|title=Botched Executions|publisher=Death Penalty Information Center|website=deathpenaltyinfo.org|language=en|access-date=May 4, 2018}}
• Wallace Wilkerson died after 27 minutes in pain after the firing squad failed to shoot him in the heart.{{Cite journal|last1=Acker|first1=James A.|last2=Champagne|first2=Ryan|date=May 2, 2018|title=The Execution of Wallace Wilkerson: Precedent and Portent|journal=Criminal Justice Review|volume=42|pages=349–367|doi=10.1177/0734016817702193|s2cid=148715242}} Because of this, the constitutionality of the use of the firing squad was questioned. The Supreme Court of the United States affirmed that the firing squad did not violate the Eighth Amendment in the case Wilkerson v. Utah (1879).{{cite web|url=https://www.law.cornell.edu/supremecourt/text/99/130|title=WILKERSON v. UTAH.|website=LII / Legal Information Institute|language=en|access-date=May 4, 2018}}
• In New Mexico, Thomas Ketchum was decapitated when his body fell through the trap door during his hanging.{{cite web|url=https://coloradoencyclopedia.org/article/thomas-e-ketchum|title=Thomas E. Ketchum|last=yongli|date=September 21, 2016|website=coloradoencyclopedia.org|language=en|access-date=May 4, 2018}}
• In Mississippi, Jimmy Lee Gray died after being in the gas chamber for nine minutes. During the procedure, Gray thrashed and banged his head against the metal pole behind his head while struggling to breathe.{{cite web|url=http://www.capitalpunishmentuk.org/Gray.pdf |title=Capital punishment UK |website=www.capitalpunishmentuk.org }}

Austin Sarat, a professor of jurisprudence and political science at Amherst College, in his book Gruesome Spectacles: Botched Executions and America's Death Penalty, found that from 1890 to 2010, 276 executions were botched out of a total of 8,776, or 3.15%, with lethal injections having the highest rate. Sarat writes that between 1980 and 2010 the rate of botched executions was higher than ever: 8.53 percent. Death penalty experts found that 36.8% of all executions attempted or completed in 2022 (all lethal injections) were botched.{{Cite web |date=December 7, 2022 |title=As Lethal Injection Turns Forty, States Botch a Record Number of Executions |url=https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/news/as-lethal-injection-turns-forty-states-botch-a-record-number-of-executions |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221218210543/https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/news/as-lethal-injection-turns-forty-states-botch-a-record-number-of-executions |archive-date=December 18, 2022 |access-date=December 18, 2022 |website=Death Penalty Information Center}}

In death penalty states, the governor usually has the discretionary power to commute a death sentence or to stay its execution. In some states the governor is required to receive an advisory or binding recommendation from a separate board. In a few states like Georgia, the board decides alone on clemency. At the federal level, the power of clemency belongs to the President of the United States.{{cite web|title=Clemency|url=https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/facts-and-research/clemency#:~:text=Clemency%20is%20the%20process%20by,for%20a%20variety%20of%20reasons.|publisher= deathpenaltyinfo.org |access-date=January 14, 2021}}

The largest number of clemencies was granted in January 2003 in Illinois when outgoing Governor George Ryan, who had already imposed a moratorium on executions, pardoned four death-row inmates and commuted the sentences of the remaining 167 to life in prison without the possibility of parole.{{cite web|url=http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org/node/677 |title=Illinois Death Row Inmates Granted Commutation by Governor George Ryan on January 12, 2003 |publisher=Deathpenaltyinfo.org |access-date=December 1, 2011}} When Governor Pat Quinn signed legislation abolishing the death penalty in Illinois in March 2011, he commuted the sentences of the fifteen inmates on death row to life imprisonment.{{cite news|url=http://newsblogs.chicagotribune.com/clout_st/2011/03/quinn-signs-death-penalty-ban-commutes-15-death-row-sentences-to-life.html|title=Quinn signs death penalty ban, commutes 15 death row sentences to life|date=March 9, 2011|access-date=March 9, 2011|newspaper=Chicago Tribune}}

Previous post-Furman mass clemencies took place in 1986 in New Mexico, when Governor Toney Anaya commuted all death sentences because of his personal opposition to the death penalty rendering the death penalty in New Mexico unenforceable and setting the stage for its eventual repeal in 2009. In 1991, outgoing Ohio Governor Dick Celeste commuted the sentences of eight prisoners, among them all four women on the state's death row thus postponing the resumption of death penalty until the early 21st century. And during his two terms (1979–1987) as Florida's governor, Bob Graham, although a strong death penalty supporter who had overseen the first post-Furman involuntary execution as well as 15 others, agreed to commute the sentences of six people on the grounds of doubts about guilt or disproportionality.

On December 14, 2022, outgoing Oregon governor Kate Brown commuted the death sentences of all 17 inmates on Oregon's death row to life imprisonment without parole, citing the death penalty's status as "an irreversible punishment that does not allow for correction [...] and never has been administered fairly and equitably" and calling it "wasteful of taxpayer dollars" while questioning its ability to function as a deterrence to crime.{{Cite web |date=December 14, 2022 |title=Gov. Kate Brown Commutes the Sentences of Oregon's 17 Death Row Prisoners |url=https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/news/gov-kate-brown-commutes-the-sentences-of-oregons-17-death-row-prisoners |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221218210924/https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/news/gov-kate-brown-commutes-the-sentences-of-oregons-17-death-row-prisoners |archive-date=December 18, 2022 |access-date=December 18, 2022 |website=Death Penalty Information Center}} Governor Brown also ordered the dismantling of Oregon's lethal injection chamber and death row. Prior, Oregon had an ongoing official moratorium set by prior governor John Kitzhaber in 2011 and had not carried out any executions since that of Harry Charles Moore in 1997; furthermore, in 2019, the Oregon State Senate amended the state's death penalty statutes to significantly reduce the number of crimes that warranted the death penalty, thereby invalidating many of the state's active death sentences. In 2021, David Ray Bartol's death sentence was overturned on the grounds of it being a "disproportionate punishment" in violation of Oregon's state constitution, which death penalty experts and abolitionist advocates said would provide the rationale for the eventual overturning of every other death sentence in Oregon. Brown is the third Oregon governor to commute every standing death sentence in the state, after Governor Robert D. Holmes, who commuted every death sentence passed during his tenure from 1957 to 1959, and Governor Mark Hatfield, who commuted every death sentence in the state after Oregon temporarily abolished the death penalty in accordance with a statewide vote in 1964.{{Cite web |last=Borrud |first=Hillary |date=December 13, 2022 |title=Gov. Kate Brown commutes sentences of all 17 people on Oregon's death row |url=https://www.oregonlive.com/politics/2022/12/gov-kate-brown-commutes-sentences-of-all-17-people-on-oregons-death-row.html |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221214180624/https://www.oregonlive.com/politics/2022/12/gov-kate-brown-commutes-sentences-of-all-17-people-on-oregons-death-row.html |archive-date=December 14, 2022 |access-date=December 14, 2022 |website=The Oregonian/OregonLive |language=en}}

All executions were suspended through the country between September 2007 and April 2008. At that time, the United States Supreme Court was examining the constitutionality of lethal injection in Baze v. Rees. This was the longest period with no executions in the United States since 1982. The Supreme Court ultimately upheld this method in a 7–2 ruling.

In addition to the states that have no valid death penalty statute, the following 11 states and 2 jurisdictions either have an official moratorium on executions or have had no executions for more than ten years as of {{CURRENTYEAR}}:

Since 1976, four states have only executed condemned prisoners who voluntarily waived any further appeals: Pennsylvania has executed three inmates, Oregon two, Connecticut one, and New Mexico one. In the last state, Governor Toney Anaya commuted the sentences of all five condemned prisoners on death row in late 1986.{{Cite news |date=November 14, 2020 |title=5 Death Sentences Commuted - The Washington Post |newspaper=The Washington Post |url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/1986/11/27/5-death-sentences-commuted/1a7c7cf6-215a-40aa-9d29-8db8f5b40c12/ |access-date=May 14, 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201114195057/https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/politics/1986/11/27/5-death-sentences-commuted/1a7c7cf6-215a-40aa-9d29-8db8f5b40c12/ |archive-date=November 14, 2020 }}

In California, United States District Judge Jeremy Fogel suspended all executions in the state on December 15, 2006, ruling that the implementation used in California was unconstitutional but that it could be fixed.{{cite web|url=https://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20061215/ap_on_re_us/california_death_penalty|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20061222152731/http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20061215/ap_on_re_us/california_death_penalty|url-status=dead|title=Judge says executions unconstitutional|archive-date=December 22, 2006}} California Governor Gavin Newsom declared an indefinite moratorium on March 13, 2019; he also ordered the closure and dismantling of the death chamber. In 2023, Governor Newsom ordered the relocation of death row inmates out of death row and to different prisons across the country "to phase out the practice of segregating people on death row based solely on their sentence," although no inmates were offered commutations or re-sentencing hearings related to these developments. Relocated death row inmates who obtained jobs in prison would have 70 percent of their earnings sent to their victims' families.{{cite news |last1=Miller |first1=Hayley |title=Gov. Gavin Newsom Halts Executions In California, Calls Death Penalty 'A Failure' |url=https://www.huffpost.com/entry/gavin-newsom-death-penalty-california_n_5c88e410e4b038892f4900cc |access-date=March 13, 2019 |work=Huffington Post |date=March 13, 2019}}{{Cite web |last=Westervelt |first=Eric |date=January 13, 2023 |title=California says it will dismantle death row. The move brings cheers and anger |url=https://www.npr.org/2023/01/13/1148846720/california-says-it-will-dismantle-death-row-the-move-brings-cheers-and-anger |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230528134319/https://www.npr.org/2023/01/13/1148846720/california-says-it-will-dismantle-death-row-the-move-brings-cheers-and-anger |archive-date=May 28, 2023 |access-date=May 28, 2023 |website=NPR}}

The CDCR says the move allows the state "to phase out the practice of segregating people on death row based solely on their sentence." No inmates will be re-sentenced and no death row commutations offered, officials say.

On November 25, 2009, the Kentucky Supreme Court affirmed a decision by the Franklin County Circuit Court suspending executions until the state adopts regulations for carrying out the penalty by lethal injection.{{cite web|last=Musgrave |first=Beth |url=http://www.kentucky.com/news/local/story/1035605.html |title=Decision halts lethal injections {{pipe}} Latest Local, State News |publisher=Kentucky.com |date=November 26, 2009 |access-date=December 1, 2011}}

In November 2011, Oregon Governor John Kitzhaber announced a moratorium on executions in Oregon, canceling a planned execution and ordering a review of the death penalty system in the state.{{cite news|url=http://www.oregonlive.com/pacific-northwest-news/index.ssf/2011/11/gov_john_kitzhaber_stops_all_e.html|title=Gov. John Kitzhaber stops executions in Oregon, calls system 'compromised and inequitable'|newspaper=The Oregonian|last=Jung|first=Helen|date=November 22, 2011|access-date=November 22, 2011}}

On February 13, 2015, Pennsylvania Governor Tom Wolf announced a moratorium on the death penalty. Wolf will issue a reprieve for every execution until a commission on capital punishment, which was established in 2011 by the Pennsylvania State Senate, produces a recommendation.{{cite news|title=Pennsylvania's governor suspends the death penalty|url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-nation/wp/2015/02/13/pennsylvania-suspends-the-death-penalty/|newspaper=The Washington Post|access-date=February 15, 2015|first=Mark|last=Berman|date=February 13, 2015}} The state had not executed anyone since Gary M. Heidnik in 1999.

On July 25, 2019, U.S. Attorney General William Barr announced that the federal government would resume executions using pentobarbital, rather than the three-drug cocktail previously used. Five convicted death row inmates were scheduled to be executed in December 2019 and January 2020.{{cite news|url=https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/federal-government-resume-capital-punishment-after-nearly-two-decade-lapse|title=Federal Government to Resume Capital Punishment After Nearly Two Decade Lapse|date=July 25, 2019|work=The United States Department of Justice|access-date=July 26, 2019}} On November 20, 2019, U.S. District Judge Tanya Chutkan issued a preliminary injunction preventing the resumption of federal executions. Plaintiffs in the case argued that the use of pentobarbital may violate the Federal Death Penalty Act of 1994.{{Cite news|url=https://www.npr.org/2019/11/21/781537038/judge-blocks-justice-departments-plan-to-resume-federal-executions|title=Judge Blocks Justice Department's Plan To Resume Federal Executions|website=NPR.org|date=November 21, 2019|language=en|access-date=November 21, 2019|last1=Dwyer|first1=Colin}} The stay was lifted in June 2020 and four executions were rescheduled for July and August 2020. On July 14, 2020, Daniel Lewis Lee was executed. He became the first convict executed by the federal government since 2003. Overall, thirteen federal prisoners were executed during the presidency of Donald Trump between July 2020 and January 2021. The last convict executed was Dustin Higgs on January 16, 2021. On July 1, 2021, U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland halted all federal executions pending review of the changes made under the Trump administration.

On January 20, 2025, Donald Trump issued Executive Order 14164 as one of many presidential orders he issued on the first day of his second term. It requests that the Attorney General, and thus the Department of Justice, pursue the death penalty in all federal cases whose severity makes its use appropriate. The order also requests that, whenever legal and appropriate, the Justice Department "pursue Federal jurisdiction and seek the death penalty" for the specific federal capital offenses of murder of a law enforcement officer as well as any capital crimes committed by illegal aliens in the US. On February 5, 2025,U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi formally rescinded the Biden administration's moratorium on the federal death penalty. Bondi also stated the Justice Department's intention to strengthen the death penalty and seek to apply it whenever appropriate for a capital crime, and to assist states in the implementation of death sentences.{{Cite web |date=2025-02-05 |title=Pam Bondi issued a flurry of orders on Day 1 as Trump's attorney general |url=https://www.politico.com/news/2025/02/05/pam-bondi-issued-a-flurry-of-orders-on-day-1-as-trumps-attorney-general-00202756 |access-date=2025-04-26 |website=POLITICO |language=en}}

A total of 1626 people have been executed in the United States since 1976.{{Cite web |title=Executions Overview |url=https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/executions/executions-overview |website=Death Penalty Information Center}}

• First execution: Gary Mark Gilmore on January 17, 1977
• Last execution: Oscar Franklin Smith on May 22, 2025

• Capital punishment by the United States federal government
• Capital punishment debate in the United States
• Felony murder and the death penalty in the United States
• List of death row inmates in the United States
• List of last executions in the United States by crime
• List of people executed in the United States in {{CURRENTYEAR}}
• List of people scheduled to be executed in the United States
• List of United States Supreme Court decisions on capital punishment
• Lists of people executed in the United States
• List of death row inmates in the United States who have exhausted their appeals

{{notelist}}

e. Utah, Nebraska and Indiana have only carried out one execution in the past 10 years. South Dakota only has one inmate with a death sentence. All other states in red have 2 or more people on death row and have conducted 2 or more executions in the past 10 years

f. California has the largest death row population in the western hemisphere. In 2016 voters rejected a proposal to abolish the death penalty. Los Angeles county has the most people on Death row in the country while Riverside County has the largest death row population per capita in the country.

{{reflist}}

• Marian J. Borg and Michael L. Radelet (2004). "On botched executions". In: Peter Hodgkinson and William A. Schabas (eds.) Capital Punishment. pp. 143–168. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. {{doi|10.1017/CBO9780511489273.006}}.
• Gail A. Van Norman (2010). "Physician participation in executions". In: Gail A. Van Norman et al. (eds.) Clinical Ethics in Anesthesiology. pp. 285–291. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. {{doi|10.1017/CBO9780511841361.051}}.

• {{Cite book |last=Bakken |first=Gordon Morris |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=pExe_keERQMC |title=Invitation to an Execution: A History of the Death Penalty in the United States |date=November 16, 2010 |publisher=UNM Press |isbn=978-0-8263-4858-6 |language=en}}
• {{Cite book |last=Banner |first=Stuart |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ISBN0674007514 |title=The Death Penalty: An American History |date=2002 |publisher=Harvard University Press |isbn=978-0-674-00751-2 |language=en }}{{Dead link|date=September 2023 |bot=InternetArchiveBot |fix-attempted=yes }}
• {{Cite book |last=Bessler |first=John D. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=3USmLpUJa9EC |title=Cruel & Unusual: The American Death Penalty and the Founders' Eighth Amendment |date=2012 |publisher=UPNE |isbn=978-1-55553-717-3 |language=en}}
• {{Cite book |last=Blecker |first=Robert |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=uc9OAQAAQBAJ |title=The Death of Punishment: Searching for Justice Among the Worst of the Worst |date=November 19, 2013 |publisher=Macmillan |isbn=978-1-137-27856-2 |language=en}}
• {{cite book |title=Let the Lord Sort Them: The Rise and Fall of the Death Penalty |year=2021 |first=Maurice |last=Chammah |publisher=Crown |isbn=978-1524760267}}
• {{Cite book |last1=Delfino |first1=Michelangelo |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ISBN9780972514125 |title=Death Penalty USA 2005 - 2006 |last2=Day |first2=Mary E. |date=2008 |publisher=MoBeta Publishing |isbn=978-0-9725141-2-5 |language=en }}{{Dead link|date=September 2023 |bot=InternetArchiveBot |fix-attempted=yes }}
• {{Cite book |last1=Delfino |first1=Michelangelo |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ISBN9780972514132 |title=Death Penalty USA 2003 - 2004 |last2=Day |first2=Mary E. |date=2008 |publisher=MoBeta Publishing |isbn=978-0-9725141-3-2 |language=en }}{{Dead link|date=September 2023 |bot=InternetArchiveBot |fix-attempted=yes }}
• {{Cite book |last1=Dow |first1=David |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ISBN0415932661 |title=Machinery of Death: The Reality of America's Death Penalty Regime |last2=Dow |first2=Mark |date=2002 |publisher=Routledge |isbn=978-0-415-93266-0 |language=en }}{{Dead link|date=September 2023 |bot=InternetArchiveBot |fix-attempted=yes }} Provides critical perspectives on the death penalty.
• {{Cite book |last=Garland |first=David |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ISBN9780674066106 |title=Peculiar Institution: America's Death Penalty in an Age of Abolition |date=October 22, 2012 |publisher=Harvard University Press |isbn=978-0-674-06610-6 |language=en }}{{Dead link|date=September 2023 |bot=InternetArchiveBot |fix-attempted=yes }}
• {{Cite book |last=Hartnett |first=Stephen John |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.14321/j.ctt7zt9dq |title=Executing Democracy: Volume One: Capital Punishment & the Making of America, 1683-1807 |date=2010 |publisher=Michigan State University Press |isbn=978-0-87013-869-0 |jstor=10.14321/j.ctt7zt9dq }}
• {{Cite book |last=Hartnett |first=Stephen John |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.14321/j.ctt7zt4dg |title=Executing Democracy: Volume Two: Capital Punishment and the Making of America, 1835-1843 |date=2012 |publisher=Michigan State University Press |isbn=978-1-61186-047-4 |jstor=10.14321/j.ctt7zt4dg }}
• {{Cite book |last=Lane |first=Charles |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=MlO9mAEACAAJ |title=Stay of Execution: Saving the Death Penalty from Itself |date=2010 |publisher=Rowman & Littlefield Publishers |isbn=978-1-4422-0378-5 |language=en}}
• {{Cite book |last=Megivern |first=James J. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ISBN0809104873 |title=The Death Penalty: An Historical and Theological Survey |date=1997 |publisher=Paulist Press |isbn=978-0-8091-0487-1 |language=en }}{{Dead link|date=September 2023 |bot=InternetArchiveBot |fix-attempted=yes }}
• {{Cite book |last=Osler |first=Mark William |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ISBN9780687647569 |title=Jesus on Death Row: The Trial of Jesus and American Capital Punishment |date=2009 |publisher=Abingdon Press |isbn=978-0-687-64756-9 |language=en }}{{Dead link|date=September 2023 |bot=InternetArchiveBot |fix-attempted=yes }}
• {{cite book

|title=Rough Justice: Lynching and American Society, 1874–1947

|first=Michael J.

|last=Pfeiffer

|publisher=University of Illinois Press

|year=2004

|isbn=978-0252029172

|quote=The history of lynching and the history of the death penalty in the United States are hopelessly entangled (p. 152).}}

• {{Cite book |last=Prejean |first=Helen |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ISBN0679751319 |title=Dead Man Walking: The Eyewitness Account of the Death Penalty That Sparked a National Debate |date=May 31, 1994 |publisher=Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group |isbn=978-0-679-75131-1 |language=en }}{{Dead link|date=September 2023 |bot=InternetArchiveBot |fix-attempted=yes }} Describes the case of death row convict Elmo Patrick Sonnier, while also giving a general overview of issues connected to the death penalty.

• Hoffmann, Joseph L. (2005). "Protecting the Innocent: The Massachusetts Governor's Council Report". 95 [https://scholarlycommons.law.northwestern.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?referer=&httpsredir=1&article=7187&context=jclc J. of Crim. L. & Criminology] 561.
• Vidma, Neil and Phoebe Ellsworth (June 1974). "[http://scholarship.law.duke.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1463&context=faculty_scholarship Public Opinion and the Death Penalty]" ([https://web.archive.org/web/20141220001053/http://scholarship.law.duke.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1463&context=faculty_scholarship Archive]). Stanford Law Review. Volume 26, pp. 1245–1270.

• [https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/ Death Penalty Information Center]

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