Delaware lawmakers voted last week to amend the state’s constitution to ban the death penalty. Will measurements need to pass again in the next legislative session? Required In the case of state constitutional reforms, Delaware is just the second state with an explicit constitutional bar on the death penalty. Michigan. (Death penalty is prohibited 21 additional states By law, or because they discovered laws that allow their Supreme Court to be unconstitutional. )
For death penalty opponents, this move is a rare, bright spot. this year, 26 people At this point last year, it is running nationwide. As of Tuesday night, Florida was executed Michael Bellmore people died in 2025 than any other year since 2015. The execution is Concentrated in three states (Florida, South Carolina, Texas) The decline of public support For the death penalty.
They face difficulty in getting the drugs needed for a fatal injection – mainly because they have them Opposition To use their products for execution – the state passed laws to revive A long abandoned way Like electric shock or adoption What’s not tested Like nitrogen hypoxia.
The outcome was horrifying. When Alabama killed Kenneth Smith last year in the country’s first execution of nitrogen hypoxia, witnesses said I was written and panted A few minutes. It took him at least 22 minutes for him to die.
In April this year, three South Carolina shooting squads executed Mikal Mahdi. An autopsy revealed that a bullet that could cause him, not in his mind, hit him. The immeasurable suffering While still conscious.
Last summer, South Carolina Supreme Court It was rejected It alleges that executions by fire or electrocuting a squad violated the state’s ban on “cruel or unusual” punishment. The court said those killed in the fire would experience “extreme pain” for just 10-15 seconds, unless there was a “massive failure.”
When it comes to challenges on enforcement methods, the South Carolina High Court is the only one that takes into account the constitutionality of the Shooting Squad. However, the High Court of Georgia and Nebraska Both declared cruel and unusual electric chair executions in 2001 and 2008 respectively, in violation of the state’s constitution. Florida’s It was discovered in 1999 that it was a constitution.
Meanwhile, the US Supreme Court stated, “Yes It’s very clear again Not interested in the challenges of how to execute it.” I said Phillips Black, the law firm of John Mills of Public Intest, represents multiple death row inmates. “The state wants to be more willing to experiment as a direct result of federal courts participating and trying to stop them.”
This increase in experiments and implementation lies in potentially serious justice miscarriages. In September, Missouri executed Marcellus Williams despite motions by the prosecutor’s office to destroy his conviction, which originally attempted to file a lawsuit. Prosecutor Claim The new evidence undermined belief. Missouri Attorney General Andrew Bailey argued that Res judicata (the principle that political parties cannot bring up claims or defenses that have already been decided against, forbidden Williams’ relief. The state Supreme Court rejected the prosecutor’s appeal.
In Oklahoma, the state’s Supreme Court of Criminal Appeals – last year, the state’s Supreme Court on Criminal Affairs – refused to void Richard Grossip’s conviction and death sentence, despite the state’s attorney general’s concession that prosecutors needed a new trial. This term of office in the US Supreme Court I agreed to Glossip and the Attorney General I ordered the state to try Glossip again. (In that case, Mills represents Grosship.)
And yesterday, Texas Court Set a new run date – October 16th – The possible innocence caused by Robert Roberson Branch disputes In December. Roberson was sentenced to death in 2003 for murdering his daughter based on “Shaken Baby” syndrome.Junk Science. “Before he died, the bipartisan state legislative committee issued a subpoena testifying to him, either halting the subpoena to the administrator or dishonoring the subpoena. held Congress’ actions violated the separation of powers under the Texas Constitution and obstructed the legal control of the death penalty in the administrative department.
Finally, a pending lawsuit before the California Supreme Court claim The racist application of the state’s death penalty violates the equal protection clause of the state’s constitution. It is located in at least one state, Washington invalid That death penalty was imposed “in an arbitrary and racially biased manner” in violation of the state’s prohibitions of cruel punishment. That’s what black defendants all over the country It’s highly likely to happen many times He is sentenced to death more than a similarly positioned white defendant. study rear study It also shows that if the victim is white, the likelihood of death sentences increases significantly.
During a period when the U.S. Supreme Court has little interest in dealing with injustice related to the death penalty, state constitutions can provide an alternative path. “The state should be willing to give constitutional clauses independent meaning,” Mills said. “There’s an opportunity there.”
Kathrina Szymborski Wolfkot is a senior advisor at Brennan Center; State court report.
Suggested Quote: Kathrina (Kasia) Szymborski Wolfkot, The nation is working on a time when executions are surgedsᴛᴛᴇcᴏᴜʀᴛrᴇᴘᴏʀᴛ (July 17, 2025), https://statcourtreport.org/our-work/analysis-opinion/states-grapple-dath-penalty-execution-surge
