In January 2003, Governor George Ryan made headlines when he commuted the death sentences of every convicted criminal on Illinois' death row (Sarat 217). Ryan's action, which affected the death sentences of approximately 167 criminals, came after 13 Illinois death row inmates who had been sentenced to death were subsequently exonerated of their charges (Flock n.p.). Ryan explained his decision by referring to Illinois' death penalty system as "arbitrary and capricious, and therefore immoral" (Sarat 217). He asked that "[i]f the system was making so many errors in determining whether someone was guilty in the first place, how fairly and accurately was it determining which guilty defendants deserved to live and which deserved to die?"
The questions Ryan asked of Illinois' death penalty scheme have been asked of death penalty schemes across the United States and the world throughout the twentieth century. In some cases, the response to these questions has been to abolish the death penalty, as all countries in the European Union have done. In other cases, however, as in 38 states within the United States, the response has been that the beneficial aspects of capital punishment outweigh any of the negative aspects to which Ryan and others refer. This paper explores the history of capital punishment in the United States with a particular emphasis on its support in the country and the arguments that have been made in favor of its abolition. The paper concludes that these arguments are not likely to be resolved in any way that would soon lead to the abolition of capital punishment in the United States.
Capital punishment has existed in the United States since the colonial era (Ferrall 299). In those days, many offenses were punished by death. For example, death sentences were imposed for crimes such as burglary, adultery, and counterfeiting (Lund 122). The executions of the convicted were carried out in public and were viewed as...