capital punishment

Meaning

1. 1noununcountablelegal

   The legal killing of a person as a penalty for a very serious crime, such as murder.

   Grammar: Never takes a plural or a: capital punishment is banned there.

   Patterns

   • capital punishment for something
   • abolish capital punishment

   Many countries have abolished capital punishment.

   The debate over capital punishment divided the voters.

   He argued that capital punishment does not reduce crime.

Common combinations

abolish capital punishment

The country voted to abolish capital punishment.

support capital punishment

Polls show many people still support capital punishment.

oppose capital punishment

The group opposes capital punishment on moral grounds.

reintroduce capital punishment

Some lawmakers want to reintroduce capital punishment.

debate over capital punishment

The debate over capital punishment is long and bitter.

Synonyms and how they differ

death penalty

Death penalty is the more common everyday phrase and means the same thing.

execution

Execution refers to the act of carrying out the sentence, not the system of punishment.

capital sentence

Capital sentence is the specific sentence given to one person.

Word family

capital adjective

punishable by death, as in a capital offense

capital offense noun

a crime that can be punished by death

punish verb

to make someone suffer for wrongdoing

punishment noun

a penalty for wrongdoing

Commonly confused: capital punishment or corporal punishment?

Practice

Make it your own

Write a sentence using “capital punishment”, then check it and compare it with the examples above.

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