The Inter-American human rights system of the Organization of American States, encompassing the Western hemisphere, is one of two regional systems with a convention abolishing the death penalty. Several years behind the European system in adopting this protocol, the Inter-American instrument only came into force in 1991. Yet Latin American countries such as Uruguay and Venezuela played a pivotal role within the United Nations in promoting abolition of the death penalty. Several Latin American States abolished the death penalty in the nineteenth century or early in the twentieth century. Many Latin American constitutions contain references to the death penalty, usually limiting its scope, or providing for due process in capital cases, or, in some cases, declaring it to be abolished. According to Roger Hood's study, ‘[t]he hundred year tradition of abolition in South America now holds sway over almost all of the region… However, history shows that, in this region at times of political instability, military governments may reinstate the death penalty for a variety of offences against the state and public order’. On the other hand, the membership of the Organisation of American States also includes some of the most enthusiastic retentionist States, including Jamaica, Trinidad and Tobago, and the United States.

Inter-American human rights law has drawn on both the United Nations and European human rights traditions.