1) The death penalty does not deter violent crime, and may even increase it. No credible study in the world has ever shown that the death penalty is a deterrent to violent crime. In fact, violent crime frequently increases right after highly publicized executions. (From 1907-1963, New York state--which carried out more executions than any other state during that period--averaged two additional homicides in the month following an execution.) The F.B.I. Uniform Crime Reports Division publication Crime in the U.S. shows that states which have abolished the death penalty averaged 4.9 murders per 100,000 population; states still using the death penalty averaged 7.4 murders. Since abolishing the death penalty in 1976, Canada has witnessed a lower murder rate.

2) The death penalty costs more than life imprisonment. Because life is at stake, capital cases necessarily take longer. Any defendant convicted in state court has the right to initiate judicial review at 11 different levels. The final stages of a capital case can last a decade or more and generate enormous litigation costs. This extensive system of appeals has proven necessary, since in over half of capital cases, either sentence or conviction is overturned due to lower court error. A 1982 study by the New York Public Defenders Association showed the cost of litigating a model New York capital case across the first three levels of review to be $1.8 million. The cost for 40 years of life in prison: $602,000. A 1988 Florida study concluded that taxpayers pay over $3.1 million per execution.

3) The death penalty is racist and unfair. The people who are sentenced to death are often not those who commit the most atrocious crimes, but rather those with low social status and limited resources. (More than 75% of those on death row could not afford to hire a defense lawyer; they are frequently appointed inexperienced attorneys by the court). Of 3,939 people executed in the USA since 1930, 54% were people of color. Since 1972, 84% of those executed were convicted of killing white people, even though almost half of all homicide victims during that period were black. In a 1983 study of Georgia sentencing, capital defendants who killed white victims were 11 times more likely to receive the death sentence than those who killed black victims.

4) Innocent people are executed. A study published by the Stanford Law Review found that at least 350 people were mistakenly convicted of potentially capital crimes from 1900-1985. Twenty-three of these people were executed for crimes they never committed. In January of 1993, the Supreme Court ruled that a state may execute someone even if strong evidence appears suggesting that the person is innocent. Justice Harry Blackmun wrote in the dissenting opinion that the ruling violates "any standard of decency to execute someone who is actually innocent," bringing an execution "perilously close to simple murder."

5) The death penalty violates our Constitution and international standards. The US Constitution's Eighth Amendment prohibits "cruel and unusual punishment." Two Supreme Court Justices have voted in the past 20 years that capital punishment violates this amendment: Thurgood Marshall and William J. Brennan, Jr.. The USA is the only member of NATO which carries out executions. In the Americas only Cuba, Jamaica, Barbados and a few other island states actually use the death penalty; most Latin American nations reject it. The United Nations, the Council of Europe, the Organization of American States and the World Council of Churches all support abolition of the death penalty.

6) Public opinion supports alternatives to the death penalty. When offered a range of sentencing options, respondents in several polls have shown a preference for imprisonment rather than execution. A 1987 U.S. Justice Department poll, for instance, found imprisonment favored over the death penalty by a 2-1 margin as the sentence for first degree murder. Numerous state polls have found the public ready to abolish capital punishment in favor of a sentence of 25 years or more, combined with restitution to the victim's family.