He says capital punishment is coming to an end because the laws have made it harder to achieve so it’s more and more capricious.
Capital punishment is ending because of a wholesome squeamishness that reflects (in Chief Justice Earl Warren’s words) society’s “evolving standards of decency.” And because attempts to make it neither cruel nor unusual have made its implementation increasingly capricious, and hence morally absurd.
In some places, that’s no doubt true. In others, the capriciousness of it and the lack of decency are features not bugs. The last US Attorney General actually reinstated the federal death penalty. The current Supreme Court just ruled that you can sentence children to life without parole on the basis of one crime. Nothing cruel or unusual about that?
As for evolving standards of decency, I’ll just leave you with this:
