U.S. Death Penalty Support at 60%.

Byline: Jeffrey M. Jones

Synopsis: Americans' basic support for the death penalty is essentially the same as last year, at 60%, but remains down from the prior two decades.

PRINCETON, N.J. -- As voters in several states prepare to vote on death penalty initiatives, 60% of Americans say they are in favor of the death penalty for persons convicted of murder. This figure is similar to the 61% average since 2011 but down from 66% support between 2000 and 2010 and the all-time high of 80% in 1994. Support for the death penalty has not been lower since it was 57% in November 1972.

California, Nebraska and Oklahoma are the latest in a series of states to reconsider their death penalty laws. Voters will decide on the legality of the death penalty in those states in Election Day referenda.

The latest results on Gallup's basic death penalty question are based on Gallup's annual Crime poll, conducted Oct. 5-9. Gallup first asked this question in 1936 and has measured it 47 times in total, including at least annually since 1999.

Americans' current level of support for capital punishment is similar to what Gallup measured in 1936, when 59% favored the death penalty and 38% opposed it. These attitudes have fluctuated a great deal over the 80 years since.

Support for the death penalty increased to 68% in a 1953 survey conducted shortly after Julius and Ethel Rosenberg were convicted of spying for the Soviet Union and executed for their crimes. Americans' support for the death penalty then declined for the remainder of the 1950s and throughout much of the 1960s. During this time, legal experts debated whether the death penalty constituted "cruel and unusual punishment." Several successful legal challenges to various aspects of state death penalty laws led to a decade-long moratorium on U.S. executions from the mid-1960s to the mid-1970s.

In 1966, more Americans were opposed (47%) than in favor (42%) of the death penalty, the only time that has occurred in Gallup's trend. In 1972, the U.S. Supreme Court struck down all state death penalty statutes because of concerns of arbitrary sentencing.

Support for the death penalty recovered in the 1970s as states rewrote their statutes to address the Supreme Court's concerns and the new laws generally passed court muster. By 1976, less than a year before executions resumed in the U.S., two-thirds of Americans expressed support for the death penalty.

The percentage of Americans favoring the death penalty increased...

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