In January 1999, the Log Cabin Club formally endorsed the prosecutor's decision to seek the death penalty. Since the news of Log Cabin's endorsement, progressive grassroots activists have called upon leading gay organizations to take a position against the death penalty. Rather than ending the death penalty, states began rewriting their death penalty statutes to require more guidance to juries in sentencing. New York became the 38th state to reintroduce the death penalty in March 1995. The death penalty does not deter crime.
Many people argue that the death penalty is an effective deterrent to crime.
However, studies between 1976 and 1995 show little correlation between the number of executions and the murder rate. The national murder rate between that time has varied from a low of 7.9 to a high of 10.2 per 100,000 population. In 1976, when the death penalty was reinstated, the murder rate was 8.8. Since then, the number of executions has increased substantially, with 68 in the first 10 years, and 245 in the second decade, while the murder rate has stayed basically the same, ending 1995 at 8. Comparisons of states with and without capital punishment show that the death penalty is no more effective than imprisonment in deterring murder, and that having the death penalty may actually increase the rate of murder.