An Overview of the Death Penalty and Capital Trials: History, Current Status, Legal Procedures, and Cost

There are several reasons to expect that the issue of capital punishment will continue to demand the attention of the public and the media. To provide necessary background for the articles that follow, we present a brief history of the death penalty in the United States and describe the American system of capital jurisprudence. We also present a detailed examination of one issue that frequently surfaces in discussions of capital punishment—the financial cost of the death penalty and its attendant procedures. Finally, we briefly describe each of the articles in this JSI issue. These articles examine the death penalty and capital trials from the perspective of social science.