Blue Nation Review - Bring Fairness to the Criminal Justice System

Ferguson. Cleveland. Staten Island. North Charleston. Baltimore.

These are not just instances of police brutality. The problem is deeper than that. We have a flawed criminal justice system urgently in need of reform.

Unjustly long mandatory minimum sentences handed down over several decades for low-level, often non-violent, drug offenses have resulted in inhumane and costly prison overcrowding, kept generations of children from their parents, and helped embolden wild-west policing tactics in inner city neighborhoods that degrade and even ignore residents’ humanity. And those tactics are shaped by perverse financial incentives that allow police departments to keep money confiscated in minor drug arrests, arrests that, when made in sufficient numbers, help keep federal grant funds flowing. It’s cash register justice for these police departments.

Congress mistakenly created these problems, and it is past time for Congress to come up with a smarter approach. We should not focus solely on punishment; doing so merely exacerbates the underlying causes of our societal problems. Too many Americans are stuck in prison due to the bad actions of legislators who passed bad laws that no longer reflect the public will.

Five years ago, Congress passed the Fair Sentencing Act, to reduce the shameful 100-1 sentencing disparity between those arrested with crack—mostly young, African American men— compared to those arrested with essentially the same drug in powder form, who are more likely to be Caucasian. But the law is not retroactive. So, while the nation’s views on drug policy have changed, countless prisoners sentenced prior to the Fair Sentencing Act remain locked up, serving sentences that should be considered invalid as they are void against public policy.

With opposition to the failed policies of over-criminalization growing every day, Congress should immediately act to catch up with the American people. But those still spending every day in prison cells should not have to wait on a gridlocked Congress; the President can immediately correct the injustices caused by outdated, unfair policies.

The President should be guided by Dr. King’s “fierce urgency of now” and use his constitutional authority to issue commutations to Americans locked behind bars serving sentences that would already have ended if issued under current federal law. But in recent years, the commutation and pardon powers have not been used often for this purpose.

If, as Dr. King wrote, “justice too long delayed is justice denied,” then every day those whose sentences are void against public policy continue to sit in prison serving sentences that policymakers—and the American people—believe no longer fit their crime is another day that justice is denied.

President Obama has expressed a preference for older cases for his clemency orders, as those who have served longer sentences have more opportunity to establish exemplary post-conviction conduct and demonstrate remorse. He doesn’t have to look too far to find deserving candidates. Our prisons are literally overflowing with prisoners over 50; many of them are opening new geriatric wards at considerable expense to the taxpayer.

In addition to the human cost, the economic cost of keeping this aging population behind bars is staggering. The Bureau of Prisons has seen health care costs skyrocket 55 percent in recent years. We now spend roughly the same amount on health care for prisoners as we do on the entire agency that put many of them behind bars in the first place, the Bureau of Alcohol Tobacco, Firearms & Explosives. It doesn’t make any sense.

The My Brother’s Keeper Alliance that the President announced he will spearhead after leaving office could help address the root causes of these problems, but he will never be more effective or more powerful than he is as President, right now. Not after his Presidency ends. Our inner cities are rotting after decades of being ignored and neglected. The highly-publicized police shootings in recent months are symptoms of the broader problems.

With the stroke of a pen, President Obama can help these communities immediately and in a big way. By commuting the sentences of the thousands languishing in prisons serving invalid sentences, he would help address a number of problems. Instead of wasting millions of tax dollars each year incarcerating non-violent drug offenders, we could reinvest that funding in our communities to create jobs and improve neighborhoods. Instead of locking up countless African-American fathers, we can return them to their families and let children grow up with their parents. And instead of breeding contempt for the justice system, we can begin to rebuild the trust between our communities and law enforcement agencies that is necessary for a productive society.

The fierce urgency of now demands that the President act to commute these unjust sentences and help our inner city communities at the same time.