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The Federal Death Penalty Abolition Act is a proposed United States law that would abolish the death penalty for all federal crimes and all military crimes. If enacted, this act would mark the first time since 1988 where no federal crimes carry a sentence of death.
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 Puerto Rico repealed it in 1929 and the District of Columbia in 1981.
Nearly all countries in this region have abolished the death penalty as a form of punishment, and the last country that still has it in law has not used it since 1982 and is considered de facto abolitionist. Australia abolished the death penalty completely in 1985.
The death penalty is sought in only a fraction of murder cases, and it is often doled out capriciously. The National Academy of Sciences concludes that its role as a deterrent is ambiguous.
Last year, four countries abolished the death penalty for all crimes, as Amnesty International noted in a recent report: Kazakhstan, Papua New Guinea, Sierra Leone and the Central African Republic.
South Sudan, however, has not yet abolished the death penalty and stated that it must first amend its Constitution, and until that happens it will continue to use the death penalty. [284] Among non-governmental organizations (NGOs), Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch are noted for their opposition to capital punishment.
The following are the five states with the most executions since the early 1980s, according to the Death Penalty Information Center: Texas, 591. Oklahoma, 126. Virginia, 113. Florida, 106.
Even though Michigan abolished the death penalty in 1846, the Federal death penalty can still be imposed. Thus, the United States was able to execute Tony Chebatoris at the Federal Detention Farm (now Federal Correctional Institution, Milan) near Milan, Michigan in 1938, for a murder he committed while robbing a federal bank in Midland, Michigan.