ll was executed in Virginia for treason. By 1612,
             the death penalty was imposed for all kinds of minor offenses, including
             petty theft of grapes[i] By 1630, the Massachusetts colony held its first
             execution, with the New York colony following suit in 1665. Under New York
             law, hitting one's parents or denying the existence of God were included in
             By the early 20th century, different states in the Union had different
             practices regarding the death penalty. Nevada instituted the use of
             cyanide gas in 1924 as a more humane alternative for its inmates. The
             period of the Great Depression also saw an increase in executions. On
             average, there were 167 executions per year during the 1930s[iii] than
             during any other period in American history.
             In the 1950s, however, a tide of anti-death penalty sentiments swept
             through the United States. By 1972, these sentiments bloomed into Furman
             v. Georgia, which argued that the death penalty was often a result of
             arbitrary sentencing. This Supreme Court decision held that death penalty
             statues had to be rewritten, to eliminate "cruel and unusual" forms of
             punishment. Though the decision found that capital punishment was
             unconstitutional, it left the door open for states to revise their methods
             of execution, in order to comply with the new statutes.
             Today, majority of the states have death penalty statutes. Only 12
             states do not have the death penalty. Currently, each death penalty state
             has different categories of death penalty crimes. However, these crimes
             revolve around different forms of homicide and, in some instances,
             aggravated kidnapping, aircraft hijacking and capital sexual assault.
             Many well-meaning death penalty activists have argued for the
             abolition of the death penalty. However, as this paper will show, many of
             these reasons are misguided or illogical.
             First, many opponents of the death penalty ar...