Study Shows Trends in Executions, Death Sentences Closely Track Drop in Public Support for the Death Penalty

Historical trends in exe­cu­tions and new death sen­tences close­ly track changes in pub­lic atti­tudes about the death penal­ty and crime in gen­er­al, accord­ing to a com­pre­hen­sive University of North Carolina analy­sis of nation­al pub­lic opin­ion sur­veys on the death penalty. 

UNC-Chapel Hill Professor Frank Baumgartner has cre­at­ed a sta­tis­ti­cal index of pub­lic sup­port for cap­i­tal pun­ish­ment based upon the results of 488 nation­al sur­veys on the death penal­ty over the last 40 years. This index doc­u­ments the close rela­tion­ship between steep nation­wide declines in exe­cu­tions and new death sen­tences and the his­tor­i­cal declines in pub­lic sup­port for the death penalty. 

Baumgartner says the pub­lic opin­ion polls show that sup­port for the death penal­ty and for puni­tive crim­i­nal jus­tice poli­cies in gen­er­al have declined sub­stan­tial­ly since 1976. He observes that ​“The num­ber of death sen­tences tracks close­ly with pub­lic opin­ion toward that form of pun­ish­ment.… As the pub­lic has increas­ing­ly spurned the death penal­ty, death sen­tences have also declined.” 

Baumgartner’s study also shows that the num­ber of coun­ties and states car­ry­ing out exe­cu­tions, as well as the num­ber of exe­cu­tions and new death sen­tences, have all declined in a pat­tern close­ly track­ing the drop in pub­lic sup­port. He con­cludes, ​“No mat­ter how we look at it, for the past 20 years, the death penal­ty has been dying.” (Click to enlarge image.)

Baumgartner sees a cor­re­la­tion between fad­ing pub­lic sup­port for puni­tive crime mea­sures and the chang­ing pol­i­tics of crim­i­nal jus­tice issues. He pre­dicts that the polit­i­cal cli­mate on the death penal­ty will also shift: ​“The death penal­ty is still reg­u­lar­ly used in few places in the United States — because just as with mass incar­cer­a­tion, the pub­lic no longer favors it…And where pub­lic opin­ion goes, polit­i­cal lead­ers even­tu­al­ly catch up.”