Death Penalty Essay Pro

The death penalty has been around for centuries and virtually every country worldwide has used it at some point in their history. According to the Death Penalty Information Center some common ways of execution, centuries ago, were crucifixions, stoning people, beating to death, drownings, burning people alive and stabbing (DPIC, 2016). Not until the tenth century did hanging become popular and it was not present worldwide, just mainly in Britain. Later, in the 1700’s Britain’s ruler, William the Conqueror did not want anyone to be executed unless his country was in a time of war. However, the next ruler Henry VIII, found great pleasure in executions. He executed an estimated seventy-two thousand people. Henry VIII also liked to use methods other than hanging, for example, boiling alive, burning at the stake, beheading and or even marrying a person of Jewish faith (Bedau, 2004). Over the next two centuries more than one hundred types of crime were punishable by death in Britain. When European settlers came to America and created the colonies, with them came the death penalty. In 1608 Captain George Kendall was executed for being a spy in Spain and this was the very first execution in the newly developed colonies (Bedau, 2004). When our country created the thirty-three amendments, the fifth, eighth and …show more content…
People favoring the death penalty started to propose changes to the state law to go back to the death penalty. Some other states started writing new statutes they thought would be appropriate, 34 states proceeded with new death penalty laws in 1976 (DPIC, 2016). Other states wanted to limit Judge and Jury discretion and started forging new guidelines to follow in death penalty cases. Different states have different procedures, Utah, for example, has its own way of implementing the death penalty. The Utah bill states “If a court holds that execution by lethal injection is unconstitutional on