The contradictions of American capital punishment / Franklin E. Zimring.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Zimring, Franklin E.

Series:

Studies in crime and public policy

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Capital punishment--United States.

Capital punishment.

United States.

Physical Description:

x, 258 pages : illustrations ; 25 cm.

Place of Publication:

Oxford ; New York : Oxford University Press, 2003.

Summary:

Why does the United States continue to employ the death penalty when fifty other developed democracies have abolished it? Why does capital punishment become more problematic each year? How can the death penalty conflict be resolved? In The Contradictions of American Capital Punishment, Frank Zimring reveals that the seemingly insoluble turmoil surrounding the death penalty reflects a deep and longstanding division in American values, a division that he predicts will soon bring about the end of capital punishment in our country. On the one hand, execution would seem to violate our nation's highest legal principles of fairness and due process. It sets us increasingly apart from our allies and indeed is regarded by European nations as a barbaric and particularly egregious form of American exceptionalism. On the other hand, the death penalty represents a deeply held American belief in violent social justice that sees the hangman as an agent of local control and safeguard of community values. Zimring uncovers the most troubling symptom of this attraction to vigilante justice in the lynch mob. He shows that the great majority of executions in recent decades have occurred in precisely those Southern states where lynchings were most common a hundred years ago. It is this legacy, Zimring suggests, that constitutes both the distinctive appeal of the death penalty in the United States and one of the most compelling reasons for abolishing it. Imprecably researched and engagingly written, The Contradictions of American Capital Punishment casts a clear new light on America's long and troubled embrace of the death penalty.

Contents:

I. Divergent Trends 1

1. The Peculiar Present of American Capital Punishment 3

2. More Than a Trend: Abolition in the Developed Nations 16

3. The Symbolic Transformation of American Capital Punishment 42

II. Explaining the American Difference 65

4. Federalism and Its Discontents 67

5. The Vigilante Tradition and Modern Executions 89

6. The Consequences of Contradictory Values 119

III. Capital Punishment in the American Future 141

7. The No-Win 1990s 143

8. The Beginning of the End 179

Appendix A Statistical Materials on Lynchings and Executions 207

Appendix B Reported Frequencies of National Death Penalty Policy, 1980 to 2001 213

Appendix C Death Row and Execution Statistics 227

Appendix D New Survey Analysis Materials 229

Appendix E Justified Killings by Citizens and Police, by State 237

Appendix F Review of Death Penalty Exoneration Data from the Death Penalty Information Center 241.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references (pages [243]-249) and index.

ISBN:

0195152360

OCLC:

50334054