Abolishing The Death Penalty

It is unfortunately a sad fact that some alleged wrongdoers who never committed a crime that they were charged with get executed. According to Death Penalty Information Center, since 1973, 150 people have been exonerated (DPIC, 2015). This figure does not however include those who have been executed for a crime that they have never committed to. This figure alone energizes abolitionists of capital punishment to pursue their ultimate agenda of getting rid of capital punishment altogether. At least thus far, the number of death penalty executions are declining although not gone altogether as the abolitionists may have hoped. Since 2010, for five years now the number of death penalty executions are declining or stayed the same. (DPIC, 2015). …show more content…
There has also been some progress to their credit. The success is not to the point where the abolitionists wanted which is the abolishing of the death penalty at least in the federal level. That being said, 19 states have abandoned the death penalty in part thanks to those who have been advocating the abolishing of the death penalty. There are also states where although the death penalty is technically in the books and there is a chance that someday someone may legally within that state’s jurisdiction face the possibility of death penalty, there are certain states in the union that have not executed anyone. California has the largest death rows in the union and it is yet to abolish the death penalty as of this moment, so theoretically at least some of the convicted criminals or even all of the convicted criminals may face the death penalty. Of course, California could also theoretically become the 20th states in the union to abolish the death penalty. It is also a possibility that either a piece of legislation passed in Congress with a signature of a President of the United States of America or a rule by the Supreme Court of the United States of America declare that the death penalty is unconstitutional perhaps using the eight amendment’s cruel and unusual punishment although both scenarios are unlikely to happen. In different polls on the topic of capital punishment also known as the death penalty, majorities seem to have supported the use of death penalty although the gaps seem to have shrunken although it too is not expected to be a permanent one even with the unlikely possibility that it may change in the opposite way and the support for the abolitionist of the death penalty may actually surpass that off the supporters of the death