Wow, that's pretty similar to the states with gay marriage.
The pattern is different in that abolition of capital punishment has been historically much more of an Upper Midwestern thing. MI, MN, and WI, along with Maine, have all been death penalty free for over a century. Then AK and HI didn't have it when they joined the union. The death penalty then left New England - except NH. It's still legal in the West Coast states, but moratoriums have been issued in the past few years.
It's a shame the vote didn't go through in NH, but it seems like NH has something close to de facto abolition in any case. There haven't been any executions there in over 70 years, so I think it can be abolished altogether in the next few years, before the one person on death row now is in any danger of execution.
