State murder

The USA has passed a grim milestone today, by executing it's 1000th prisoner since re-introducing the death penalty in 1976.

As seen from the table below (source), this marks the freedom loving USA as the 4th most murderous state in the world, following behind such enlightened regimes as China, Iran and Vietnam.

Most Executions in 2004 1. CHINA (At least 3,400 Executions) 2. IRAN (Approx. 159) 3. VIET NAM (Approx. 64) 4. UNITED STATES (59)

5. Saudi Arabia (33) 6. Pakistan (15) 7. Kuwait (9) 8. Bangladesh (7)

9. Egypt (6) Singapore (6) Yemen (6)

It's good to know they have taken it upon themselves to ensure all states around the world will follow their regime of freedom, enlightenment and justice for all, isn't it?

Looking at the US states that do & do not have the death penalty, I wonder vif anyone has done much research on it's effect? For example, look at this map and can anyone tell me if Kansas (no death penalty) crime statistics are higher/worse than Texas' (highest number of executions of all states)?

UPDATE: as requested by a couple of commenters, below is a breakdown of the number of executions carried out by each state:

Executions since 1976, by jurisdiction
Jurisdiction	Executions since 1976 (as of December 2, 2005)[1][2]	Inmates on Death Row (as of July 1, 2005)[3]
Texas	355	414
Virginia	94	23
Oklahoma	79	97
Missouri	66	55
Florida	60	388
Georgia	39	112
North Carolina	39	192
Alabama	34	191
South Carolina	34	77
Arkansas	27	38
Louisiana	27	89
Arizona	22	128
Ohio	19	196
Indiana	16	30
Delaware	14	19
Illinois	12	10
Nevada	11	85
California	11	648
Mississippi	6	70
Utah	6	10
Maryland	4	9
Washington	4	10
Pennsylvania	3	233
U.S. Federal Gov't.	3	36
Nebraska	3	10
Kentucky	2	37
Montana	2	4
Oregon	2	32
Tennessee	1	108
Idaho	1	21
Connecticut	1	8
Colorado	1	3
New Mexico	1	2
Wyoming	1	2
New Jersey	0	14
Kansas (On December 17, 2004, the death penalty statute of Kansas was declared unconstitutional)	0	7
U.S. Military	0	8
New York (On June 24, 2004, the death penalty statute of New York was declared unconstitutional)	0	2
South Dakota	0	4
New Hampshire	0	0
United States total	1,000	3,415*