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Journal of Research in Crime and Delinquency
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Reassessing the Racial Divide in Support for Capital Punishment

The Continuing Significance of Race

James D. Unnever

Mississippi State University

Francis T. Cullen

University of Cincinnati, OH

This project investigates the racial divide in support for capital punishment. The authors examine whether race has a direct effect on support for capital punishment and test whether the influence of race varies across class, being a native southerner, confidence in government officials, political orientation, and religious affiliation. Using data drawn from the General Social Survey, they find a substantial racial divide, with African Americans much less likely to support the death penalty. Furthermore, the analysis revealed little support for the "spurious/social convergence" hypothesis; shared factors that might be expected to bring African Americans and Whites together—class, confidence in government, conservative politics, regional location, and religious fundamentalism—either did not narrow African American-White punishment attitudes or, at best, had only modest effects. The Results suggest that the racial divide in support for capital punishment is likely to remain a point of symbolic contention in African American-White conceptions of criminal injustice in the United States.

Key Words: race and capital punishment • death penalty attitudes • racial divide

Journal of Research in Crime and Delinquency, Vol. 44, No. 1, 124-158 (2007)
DOI: 10.1177/0022427806295837
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