.Interesting. So people actually are generally in favor of it. Then where did it go? Why don't we have it anymore?

I asked my husband and he said (in brief) the lack of principles today is the cause of people opposing capital punishment.

A civilised society demands the possibility of applying the death penalty where necessary.

Many of these issues point to women's suffrage here in the US.  Once women had the right to vote here in the US, everything went downhill from there, including the election of politicians who are anti-death penalty.

Women tend to be more solidly anti-death penalty than men.  The logic follows thus:  All murder is killing, but not all killing is murder.  I have had quite few liberal Catholics tell me, "The death penalty is murder."  Not true!  The definition of murder is, "The intentional taking of an innocent human life."  The far majority of the death row inmates are not innocent, and should the truth be known, many of those on death row who might be innocent of their alleged crimes, should be put to death for the crimes which they were never charged for.   

I remember the Clinton years, and quite a few women told me they voted for Billy Boy because he was cute.  This is insane, but when we look at the numbers of women in America who voted Clinton, there is probably a lot of truth in this.  He is a smooth talker and he looks good, let us vote for him. 

I think you have an interesting point.  The society has become effeminate. But is it because of the women (taking over), the men (letting them), both, or something else?  Maybe if we reestablish a good Catholic society these things would go back to the way God intended.  For now I guess we just have to muddle through this world with our strong Catholic principles.

This article may be of interest to you and the others in this thread: "The Death Penalty Abolition Movement and Modernism".

To summarize its basic argument, the first nation in modern times to abolish the death penalty was Tuscany back in the late 1700s. It was done under the reign of Grand Duke Leopold II, who was also a enthusiastic patron of the heretical Synod of Pistoia. Both these acts sprang from his deeply liberal (in the "Enlightenment" sense) sentiments; thus religious and political modernism were intertwined, and we see the same story today.