Changes

==History==

==History==

In American history, there was regional variation in the use of the death penalty (with [[The South]] always higher), the execution rate (per million people) dropped steadily between the colonial period and the present, that the number of crimes meriting the death penalty was sharply reduced, and few women were executed, while a disproportionate number of African American, ethnic, and poor men died at the hands of the state.  In [[Colonial America]], capital punishment was used more frequently, as it fit into the context of colonial life. Rates of execution were similar to those in England and matched the general violence of colonial life. There were no prisons for long-term incarceration (only jails for brief incarcerations.) Public executions served as communal warnings. By the 1790s, executions began to decline. Many capital offenses were dropped, the methods of execution changed, and long-term incarceration in prison emerged as the preferred alternative punishment. Executions disappeared from the public square except in the cases of [[lynchings]], which grew in numbers in the South after the Civil War.<ref>Allen and Clubb (2008)</ref>

In American history, there was regional variation in the use of the death penalty (with [[The South]] always higher), the execution rate (per million people) dropped steadily between the colonial period and the present, that the number of crimes meriting the death penalty was sharply reduced, and few women were executed, while a [[disproportionate]] number of African American, ethnic, and poor men died at the hands of the state.  In [[Colonial America]], capital punishment was used more frequently, as it fit into the context of colonial life. Rates of execution were similar to those in England and matched the general violence of colonial life. There were no prisons for long-term incarceration (only jails for brief incarcerations.) Public executions served as communal warnings. By the 1790s, executions began to decline. Many capital offenses were dropped, the methods of execution changed, and long-term incarceration in prison emerged as the preferred alternative punishment. Executions disappeared from the public square except in the cases of [[lynchings]], which grew in numbers in the South after the Civil War.<ref>Allen and Clubb (2008)</ref>

 

==Religious views of capital punishment==

==Religious views of capital punishment==

===Christianity===

===Christianity===