The Washington Post assesses the death penalty in an editiorial, 2003: The Year in Death:

In 2002, 65 percent of executions took place in only three states -- Texas, Oklahoma and Missouri. This year Texas alone accounted for 24 executions. The top three states -- Texas, Oklahoma (which killed 14) and North Carolina (seven) -- together carried out 69 percent of the executions nationally. Add in Georgia, Florida, Ohio and Alabama, each of which killed three, and 88 percent of the executions have been accounted for. Only 11 states -- along with the federal government -- carried out executions, the lowest number since 1993. In other words, even as the number of executions holds relatively steady, fewer states are doing more of the dirty work.

This is good news for those who believe, as we do, that capital punishment ought to be abolished. Right now the political consensus in most states does not exist to get rid of it. Politicians are committed to the death penalty, and solid majorities of the public support it as well. The best prospect for long-term change lies in the ongoing demonstration that the death penalty isn't necessary or effective and carries great dangers. States with moribund death penalties can evolve over time into states without death penalties with no great disruption to their criminal justice systems or to the expectations of their electorates. The fewer states that execute people regularly, the more exceptional become those like Texas and Oklahoma -- which insist on using capital punishment as a routine instrument of justice.

Serious reform and ultimate abolition of the death penalty will take time. That's okay. So long as it gets here. And it seems the tide is turning, if ever so slowly:

Capital punishment in America will not disappear all of a sudden. But if serious reform efforts continue and the penalty becomes ever more regional in its application, it could begin to fade away.