Pubdate: Fri, 14 Mar 2014
Source: New York Times (NY)
Copyright: 2014 The New York Times Company
Contact: http://www.nytimes.com/ref/membercenter/help/lettertoeditor.html
Website: http://www.nytimes.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/298
Author: Jeremy W. Petersmarch
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/find?199 (Mandatory Minimum Sentencing)

G.O.P. MOVING TO EASE ITS STANCE ON SENTENCING

WASHINGTON - Not that long ago, criminal justice reform in a 
conservative place like Texas meant executing prisoners with lethal 
injection instead of the electric chair.

Now, leading Republicans are saying that mandatory minimum sentences 
in the federal system have failed - too costly, overly punitive and 
ineffective. So they are embracing a range of ideas from 
Republican-controlled states that have reduced prison populations and 
brought down the cost of incarceration.

The shift turns upside down the "war on crime" ethos on the right, 
and even among some on the left, an approach that has dominated the 
policy of punishment for more than two decades.

Religious conservatives see these efforts as offering compassion and 
the hope of reuniting broken families. Fiscal conservatives say the 
proposals would shave billions off the federal budget. The 
combination has made closing prisons and releasing inmates who no 
longer appear to pose a threat new articles of faith among 
politicians who would have rejected them out of hand only a few years ago.

It's a really inefficient use of resources - that's the Republican, 
fiscal conservative side of this," said Senator Rob Portman, 
Republican of Ohio, who has been a longtime advocate of programs in 
prison that reduce recidivism. "Then on the other side of it is: What 
do you end up with? You end up with broken families. You end up with 
communities that are being plagued with more violence and more crime. 
And you end up with people not reaching their God-given potential."

The changes represent a rare example of both parties agreeing in a 
major area of domestic policy. The Obama administration is engaged 
and supportive of the efforts in Congress, as was evident on Thursday 
when Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. endorsed a proposal that 
would reduce prison sentences for people convicted of dealing drugs, 
the latest sign that the White House is making criminal justice a 
priority of President Obama's second term.

Bipartisan talks to move forward on a broad criminal justice bill 
have escalated in recent days. Republicans and Democrats are in early 
discussions about combining two bills that the Senate Judiciary 
Committee approved overwhelmingly this year. The first would give 
judges more discretion to depart from mandatory minimum sentences in 
lower-level drug cases, cut down mandatory sentences for other drug 
offenses, and make retroactive the 2010 law that shrunk the disparity 
between cocaine and crack-cocaine sentences.

The second bill seeks to tackle the other end of the problem by 
establishing a skills-training and early-release system for those who 
already are incarcerated but are considered at low risk of committing 
another crime. Senator Harry Reid of Nevada, the majority leader, has 
signaled to both parties in the chamber that he will bring a criminal 
justice bill to the floor this year.

These proposals have united political odd couples. Senator Mike Lee 
of Utah, along with and Senator Ted Cruz and Senator John Cornyn, 
both of Texas - some of the most conservative Republicans in the 
Senate - are aligned with Senator Richard J. Durbin of Illinois and 
Senator Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island, who are among the more 
liberal Democrats. The subject consumed an animated panel discussion 
last weekend at CPAC, the annual gathering of conservatives, with 
Grover Norquist, the antitax advocate; Gov. Rick Perry of Texas; and 
Bernard B. Kerik, the former New York City police commissioner.

Mr. Cornyn, a former judge and the No. 2 Republican in the Senate, 
identified another conservative ideal behind the changes: They 
originated in the states, where most Republicans would prefer to let 
policies develop and mature. "When the states take the initiative, it 
goes from being a theory or a philosophy or an ideological discussion 
to 'What's the evidence?' " he said. "From Texas's perspective, the 
evidence is in."

In Texas, the incarcerated population has declined to its lowest 
point in a decade, and for the first time in its history, the state 
actually closed a prison in 2011 after years of struggling to find 
enough space for all of its convicts.

"I'd like to say that people wanted to keep hope on the idea that 
people, once they committed crimes, could be rehabilitated and become 
productive citizens," Mr. Cornyn added. "Actually, what I think 
happened, the more likely explanation, was that we built so many 
prisons people began to ask the question: 'Can we afford this?' "

Mr. Whitehouse noted how politically and demographically diverse the 
states were that formed the basis for the Senate's legislative model. 
"The states we'd talk most about," he said, "were Rhode Island, 
Texas, Kentucky and Pennsylvania. Go figure."

Some Republicans want to take the changes even further. Legislation 
that Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky is drafting would restore voting 
rights for some nonviolent felons and convert some drug felonies to 
misdemeanors.

Mr. Paul, who is a possible presidential candidate in 2016 and has 
been courting constituencies like African-Americans and young people 
who feel alienated by the Republican Party, said it was only a matter 
of time before more Republicans joined him.

"I'm not afraid of appearing to be not conservative enough," he said, 
explaining that he got the idea for his legislation by talking with 
black constituents in the western part of Louisville who complained 
to him that criminal convictions were often crosses to bear for 
years, keeping them from voting and getting jobs.

"I don't think most of the country thinks marijuana is a good idea," 
Mr. Paul added. "But I think most of the country thinks that if you 
happen to get caught doing it when you're a teenager you should get a 
second chance."

Like several of the Republicans who have changed their minds on the 
issue, Mr. Paul has a personal story that helped shape his position. 
The brother of a good friend, he said, is unable to vote today 
because 30 years ago he was convicted of growing marijuana - a felony.

For Mr. Portman, it was his encounters with a man about his age, a 
drug addict who had been in and out of the system several times but 
received the assistance he needed in prison to help turn around his 
life. "He's got dignity and self-respect," Mr. Portman said. "These 
stories are unbelievably encouraging."

For Mr. Lee, who like Mr. Whitehouse, Mr. Cornyn and many of the 
other lawmakers involved in drafting the legislation has experience 
as a prosecutor or judge, it was seeing firsthand the inflexible 
nature of the federal sentencing system.

"As an assistant U.S. attorney, I saw from time to time instances in 
which a judge would say, 'I'm not sure this sentence makes sense, in 
fact I have real reservations about it. But I have to,' " Mr. Lee 
said. "Those memories have stayed with me."

Some longtime supporters of overhauling the federal sentencing and 
prison systems wish Republicans had come to see their way sooner. But 
they still marvel at the turnaround.

"It's really striking," said Jeremy Haile, federal advocacy counsel 
for the Sentencing Project. "Now they're arguing the other way: who 
can be the smartest on crime."
- ---
MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom