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Racial Resentment and the Death Penalty

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 December 2022

Frank R. Baumgartner Open the ORCID record for Frank R. Baumgartner [Opens in a new window] ,
Christian Caron  and
Scott Duxbury
Frank R. Baumgartner*
Affiliation:
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Department of Political Science, MS 3265, Chapel Hill, NC, 27599-3265, USA
Christian Caron
Affiliation:
Matrix Design Group, San Antonio, TX, 78207, USA
Scott Duxbury
Affiliation:
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Department of Sociology, MS 3210, Chapel Hill, NC, 27599-3210, USA
*
*Corresponding author. E-mail: Frankb@unc.edu
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Abstract

We explore the annual number of death sentences imposed on black and white offenders within each US state from 1989 through 2017, with particular attention to the impact of aggregate levels of racial resentment. Controlling for general ideological conservatism, homicides, population size, violent crime, institutional and partisan factors, and the inertial nature of death sentencing behavior, we find that racial hostility translates directly into more death sentences, particularly for black offenders. Racial resentment itself reflects each state’s history of racial strife; we show powerful indirect effects of a history of lynching and of racial population shares. These effects are mediated through contemporaneous levels of racial resentment. Our findings raise serious questions about the appropriateness of the ultimate punishment, as they show its deep historical and contemporary connection to white racial hostility toward blacks.

Keywords

Capital punishmentdeath sentencesracial resentmentlynching
Type
Research Article
Information
Journal of Race, Ethnicity, and Politics , Volume 8 , Issue 1 , March 2023 , pp. 42 - 60
Copyright
© The Author(s), 2022. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of The Race, Ethnicity, and Politics Section of the American Political Science Association

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