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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) [40] in 1847, Wisconsin in 1853, and Maine in 1887.
The anti-death penalty movement began to pick up pace in the 1830s and many Americans called for abolition of the death penalty. Anti-death penalty sentiment rose as a result of the Jacksonian era, which condemned gallows and advocated for better treatment of orphans, criminals, poor people, and the mentally ill.
In the late 1980s, Senator Alfonse D'Amato, from New York State, sponsored a bill to make certain federal drug crimes eligible for the death penalty as he was frustrated by the lack of a death penalty in his home state. [13] The Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1988 restored the death penalty under federal law for drug offenses and some types of murder. [14]
Massachusetts judges wielded this new-found discretion in various ways for twenty years, before fines, incarceration, or the death penalty became the sole available sanctions under the state's penal code. [98] Other states—e.g., New York, Pennsylvania, and Connecticut—also lagged in their shift toward incarceration. [99]
The United States has executed 23 men this year, with six of those executions coming during one remarkable 11-day period. At least two more executions are scheduled before the end of the year.
The death penalty has been in long-term decline nationally due to unrelenting legal challenges, governor-imposed moratoriums, and difficulties acquiring the drugs used in lethal injections.
Nidal Hasan when he was still in the military.. The United States Court of Appeals for the Armed Forces ruled in 1983 that the military death penalty was unconstitutional, and after new standards intended to rectify the Armed Forces Court of Appeals' objections, the military death penalty was reinstated by an executive order of President Ronald Reagan the following year.
At yearend 2010, the death penalty was authorized by 36 states and the federal government (table 1). While New Mexico repealed the death penalty in 2009 (Laws 2009, ch. 11 § 5), the repeal was not retroactive. As of December 31, 2010, New Mexico held two men under previously imposed death sentences, and one person was awaiting sentencing