Hostname: page-component-5d84bcc8dc-qx8mr Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2026-08-13T15:15:35.528Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Distrust of Government, the Vigilante Tradition, and Support for Capital Punishment

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2024

Steven F. Messner ,
Eric P. Baumer  and
Richard Rosenfeld
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

This study probes the interconnections among distrust of government, the historical context, and public support for the death penalty in the United States with survey data for area-identified samples of white and black respondents. Multilevel statistical analyses indicate contrary effects of government distrust on support for the death penalty for blacks and whites, fostering death penalty support among whites and diminishing it among blacks. In addition, we find that the presence of a “vigilante tradition,” as indicated by a history of lynching, promotes death penalty support among whites but not blacks. Finally, contrary to Zimring's argument in The Contradictions of Capital Punishment, we find no evidence that vigilantism moderates the influence of government distrust on support for the death penalty, for either whites or blacks. Our analyses highlight the continuing influence of historical context as well as contemporary conditions in the formation of public attitudes toward criminal punishment, and they underscore the importance of attending to racial differences in the analysis of punitive attitudes.

Information

Type
Articles of General Interest
Information
Law & Society Review , Volume 40 , Issue 3 , September 2006 , pp. 559 - 590
Copyright
© 2006 Law and Society Association.

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Article purchase

Temporarily unavailable

Footnotes

We thank Tom Smith, National Opinion Research Center, for providing the geocoded GSS data used for our research and the anonymous referees for comments on an earlier version of this article.

References

References

Amnesty International (2005) “The death penalty,” http://web.amnesty.org/pages/deathpenalty-countries-eng (accessed 30 Dec. 2005).Google Scholar
Arthur, John A. (1998) “Proximate Correlates of Blacks' Support for Capital Punishment,” 21 J. of Crime and Justice 159–72.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Barkan, Steven E., & Cohn, Steven F. (1994) “Racial Prejudice and Support for the Death Penalty by Whites,” 31 J. of Research in Crime and Delinquency 202–9.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Baumer, Eric P., et al. (2003) “Explaining Spatial Variation in Support for Capital Punishment: A Multilevel Analysis,” 108 American J. of Sociology 844–75.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Beckett, Katherine, & Sasson, Theodore (2000) The Politics of Injustice: Crime and Punishment in America. Thousand Oaks, CA: Pine Forge Press.Google Scholar
Berry, William D., et al. (1998) “Measuring Citizen and Government Ideology in the American States, 1960–1993,” 42 American J. of Political Science 327–48.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Blomberg, Thomas, & Cohen, Stanley eds. (1995) Punishment and Social Control. New York: Aldine.Google Scholar
Bobo, Lawrence D., & Johnson, Devon (2004) “A Taste for Punishment: Black and White Americans' Views on the Death Penalty and the War on Drugs,” 1 Du Bois Rev. 151–80.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bohm, Robert M. (1998) “American Death Penalty Opinion: Past, Present, and Future,” in Acker, J. R., et al., eds. America's Experiment with Capital Punishment: Reflections on the Past, Present, and Future of the Ultimate Penal Sanction. Durham, NC: Carolina Academic Press.Google Scholar
Bohm, Robert M., ed. (1991) The Death Penalty in America: Current Research. Highland Heights, KY: Anderson Publishing.Google Scholar
Bonczar, Thomas P., & Snell, Tracy L. (2003) Capital Punishment, 2002. Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Justice.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Borg, Marian (1997) “The Southern Subculture of Punitiveness? Regional Variation in Support for Capital Punishment,” 34 J. of Research in Crime and Delinquency 25–45.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Borg, Marian (1998) “Vicarious Homicide Victimization and Support for Capital Punishment: A Test of Black's Theory of Law,” 36 Criminology 537–67.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Brundage, W., & Fitzhugh, , ed. (1997) Under Sentence of Death: Lynching in the South. Chapel Hill: Univ. of North Carolina Press.Google Scholar
Cohn, Steven F., et al. (1991) “Punitive Attitudes Toward Criminals: Racial Consensus or Racial Conflict?,” 38 Social Problems 287–96.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cutler, James E. (1905) Lynch-Law: An Investigation into the History of Lynchings in the United States. New York: Longsman Green.Google Scholar
Davis, James Allan, & Smith, Tom W. (1998) General Social Surveys, 1972–1998: Cumulative Codebook. Chicago: National Opinion Research Center.Google Scholar
Ellsworth, Phoebe C., & Gross, Samuel R. (1994) “Hardening of the Attitudes: Americans' Views on the Death Penalty,” 50 J. of Social Issues 19–52.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Finckenauer, James O. (1988) “Public Support for the Death Penalty: Retribution as Just Desserts or Retribution as Revenge,” 5 Justice Q. 81–100.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fox, James A., et al. (1991) “Death Penalty Opinion in the Post-Furman Years,” 28 New York University Rev. of Law and Social Change 499–528.Google Scholar
Garland, David (1990) Punishment and Modern Society. Chicago: Univ. of Chicago Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Garland, David (2000) “The Culture of High Crime Societies: Some Preconditions of Recent ‘Law and Order’ Politics,” 40 British J. of Criminology 347–75.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Garland, David (2001) The Culture of Control. Chicago: Univ. of Chicago Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gelles, Richard J., & Straus, Murray A. (1975) “Family Experience and Public Support of the Death Penalty,” 45 American J. of Orthopsychiatry 596–613.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Grasmick, Harold G., & Bursik, Robert J. Jr., et al. (1993) “Religious Beliefs and Public Support for the Death Penalty for Juveniles and Adults,” 26 J. of Crime and Justice 59–86.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Grasmick, Harold G., & Davenport, Elizabeth, et al. (1992) “Protestant Fundamentalism and the Retributive Doctrine of Punishment,” 30 Criminology 21–45.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gross, Samuel R. (1998) “Update: American Public Opinion on the Death Penalty—It's Getting Personal,” 83 Cornell Law Rev. 1448–79.Google Scholar
Guo, Guang, & Zhao, Hongxin (2000) “Multilevel Modeling for Binary Data,” 26 Annual Rev. of Sociology 441–62.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Harvey, O. J. (1986) “Belief Systems and Attitudes Toward the Death Penalty and Other Punishments,” 54 J. of Personality 659–75.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hood, Roger (1998) “Capital Punishment,” in Tonry, M., ed., The Handbook of Crime & Punishment. New York: Oxford Univ. Press.Google Scholar
Hosmer, David W. Jr., & Lemeshow, Stanley (2000) Applied Logistic Regression. New York: Wiley & Sons.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jacobs, David, & Carmichael, Jason T. (2002) “The Political Sociology of the Death Penalty: A Pooled Time-Series Analysis,” 67 American Sociological Rev. 109–31.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Keil, Thomas J., & Vito, Gennaro F. (1991) “Fear of Crime and Attitudes toward Capital Punishment: A Structural Equations Model,” 8 Justice Q. 447–64.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Longmire, Dennis R. (1996) “Americans' Attitudes About the Ultimate Weapon: Capital Punishment,” in Flanagan, T J. & Longmire, D. R., eds., Americans View Crime and Justice: A National Public Opinion Survey. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.Google Scholar
McGarrell, Edmund F., & Sandys, Marla (1996) “The Misperception of Public Opinion toward Capital Punishment,” 39 American Behavioral Scientist 500–13.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Messner, Steven F., et al. (2005) “The Legacy of Lynching and Southern Homicide,” 70 American Sociological Rev. 633–55.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Orren, Gary (1997) “Fall from Grace: The Public's Loss of Faith in Government,” in Nye, J. F. Jr. et al., eds., Why People Don't Trust Government. Cambridge, MA: Harvard Univ. Press.Google Scholar
Patterson, Lindsay (1991) “Multilevel Logistic Regression,” in Prosser, R., et al., eds., Data Analysis with ML3. London: Institute of Education, University of London.Google Scholar
Paxton, Pamela (1999) “Is Social Capital Declining in the United States? A Multiple Indicator Assessment,” 105 American J. of Sociology 88–127.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pew Research Center (1998) “How Americans View Government: Deconstructing Distrust,” http://people-press.org/reports/display.php3?ReportID=95 (accessed 13 May 2006).Google Scholar
Radelet, Michael R., & Borg, Marian J. (2000) “The Changing Nature of Death Penalty Debates,” 26 Annual Rev. of Sociology 43–61.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rankin, Joseph H. (1979) “Changing Attitudes Toward Capital Punishment,” 58 Social Forces 194–211.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Raper, Arthur (1933) The Tragedy of Lynching. Chapel Hill: Univ. of North Carolina Press.Google Scholar
Raudenbush, Stephen W., & Bryk, Anthony S. (2002) Hierarchical Linear Models: Applications and Data Analysis Methods, 2d ed. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.Google Scholar
Raudenbush, Stephen W., et al. (2001) HLM 5: Hierarchical Linear and Nonlinear Modeling. Chicago: Scientific Software International.Google Scholar
Rosenfeld, Richard, et al. (2001) “Social Ccapital and Homicide,” 80 Social Forces 283–309.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Seltzer, Richard, & McCormick, Joseph P. (1987) “The Impact of Crime Victimization and Fear of Crime on Attitudes toward Death Penalty Defendants,” 2 Violence and Victims 99–114.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Smith, Tom W. (1976) “A Trend Analysis of Attitudes Towards Capital Punishment, 1936–1974,” in Davis, J. A., ed., Studies of Social Change Since 1948, Volume III. Chicago: NORC.Google Scholar
Soss, Joe, et al. (2003) “Why Do White Americans Support the Death Penalty?,” 65 The J. of Politics 397–421.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Steelwater, Eliza (2003) The Hangman's Knot: Lynching. Legal Execution, and America's Struggle with the Death Penalty. Boulder, CO: Westview.Google Scholar
Stinchcombe, Arthur L., et al. (1980) Crime and Punishment: Changing Attitudes in America. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.Google Scholar
Taylor, Marylee C. (1998) “How White Attitudes Vary with the Racial Composition of Local Populations,” 63 American Sociological Rev. 512–35.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Taylor, D., & Garth, , et al. (1979) “The Salience of Crime and Support for Harsher Criminal Sanctions,” 26 Social Problems 413–24.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Thomas, Charles W., & Foster, Samuel C. (1975) “A Sociological Perspective on Public Support for Capital Punishment,” 45 American J. of Orthopsychiatry 641–57.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Tolnay, Stewart E., & Beck, E. M. (1992) “Racial Violence and Black Migration in the American South 1910 to 1930,” 57 American Sociological Rev. 103–16.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tolnay, Stewart E., et al. (1996) “Vicarious Violence: Spatial Effects on Southern Lynchings, 1890–1919,” 102 American J. of Sociology 788–815.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tyler, Tom R., & Boeckmann, Robert J. (1997) “Three Strikes and You Are Out, but Why?,” 31 Law & Society Rev. 237–65.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tyler, Tom R., & Weber, Renee (1982) “Support for the Death Penalty: Instrumental Response to Crime, or Symbolic Attitude?,” 17 Law & Society Rev. 21–45.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Whitehead, J. T., & Blankenship, Michael (2000) “The Gender Gap in Capital Punishment Attitudes: An Analysis of Support and Opposition,” 25 American J. of Criminal Justice 1–13.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wong, George Y., & Mason, William M. (1985) “The Hierarchical Logistic Regression Model for Multilevel Analysis,” 80 J. of the American Statistical Association 513–24.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Young, Robert L. (1991) “Race, Conceptions of Crime and Justice, and Support for the Death Penalty,” 54 Social Psychological Q. 67–75.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Young, Robert L., & Thompson, Carol Y. (1995) “Religious Fundamentalism, Punitiveness, and Firearms Ownership,” 18 J. of Crime and Justice 81–98.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Zeisel, Hans, & Gallup, Alec M. (1989) “Death Penalty Sentiment in the United States,” 5 J. of Quantitative Criminology 285–96.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Zimring, Franklin E. (2003) The Cultural Contradictions of American Capital Punishment. New York: Oxford Univ. Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Zimring, Frank E., & Hawkins, Gerald (1986) Capital Punishment and the American Agenda. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge Univ. Press.Google Scholar
Zimring, Franklin E., et al. (2001) Punishment and Democracy: Three Strikes and You're Out in California. New York: Oxford Univ. Press.Google Scholar

Case Cited

Furman v. Georgia, 408 U.S. 238 (1972).CrossRefGoogle Scholar