The Supreme Court–ordered releases from California’s horribly managed, terribly overcrowded prisons are humane and necessary. As a matter of judicial reasoning, however, my first sympathies are with justices Antonin Scalia and Samuel Alito: The specific and sweeping nature of the Court’s ruling (California must cut its prison population by 30,000 within three years) does seem to overstep a limited role for the judiciary. That said, the evidence of the truly horrendous conditions in Golden State’s prison system — the third or fourth largest correctional complex in the world depending on how one counts — really do seem to constitute just the sort of cruel and unusual punishment the judiciary ought to prevent.
The real problem here isn’t the state’s decision to build lots of correctional facilities — doing so did play a major role in reducing its once sky-high crime rate — or even its “tough on crime” laws that appropriately increased sentences for violent offenders, but rather a political paralysis that prevented commonsense, common-ground tweaks to these policies from becoming law. Other states including both famously tough-on-crime Texas and liberal, flaky-as-California Hawaii have successfully and sweepingly reformed their corrections policies, cut prison populations, intensified community supervision, and seen their crimes rates continue to decline. And they’ve done it all while maintain prison populations at historically high levels and locking up many serious violent offenders forever.
California, possessed of a dysfunctional political culture, made few of these moves and instead gave corrections individual corrections officers enormous pay increases (a few givebacks have taken place recently) while neglecting every other aspect of prison administration aside from the bricks and mortar of the prison buildings. The horrendous conditions that resulted aren’t surprising and they are certainly an indictment of California’s political culture. That said, what’s justified in California is not justified elsewhere in the country. Many many states have woken up to new, conservative thinking on crime that emphasizes effective, proportional punishment rather than simply locking people up and hoping for the best. The Supreme Court’s ruling on California, sadly, was necessary, but one hopes other states’ legislative and executive branches will do more to move towards effective prison reform without any need for the involvement of the judiciary.
— Eli Lehrer is vice president of the Heartland Institute.
When these prisoners are unleashed upon the citizenry of the left coast I wonder if the NRA won't pick up several supporters and new members in the region??
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseHow did California governance get so screwed up? You explained it. Thanks.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseIt is preposterous to talk about crime and prison overcrowding in California without mentioning the steady flow of criminals streaming into California daily from Mexico and Central and South America. If the Federal government secured the border, took custody of illegals caught committing crimes here, and deported all illegals detained for any reason then there would be no overcrowding of California prisons. There are other contributing factors to the problem, of course, but removing the illegals would solve it while fixing everything else without removing the illegals won't.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseMost of California's prisoners are locked up for nothing. They're non-violent or have drug offenses. (And don't forget "Three Strikes.")
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseCorrections is one of the biggest businesses in the state. It's been bloated for years. It's no wonder that the system has gone to heck and that the Supremes had to step in like they did.
Convince me that this decision - with its specific mandate of 30,000 - is not even MORE out of place, over-reaching and extra-legal than the school busing decisions were.
In the school busing cases, at least the judiciary's political and sociological micromanagement of society was based on a history of systematic, state-sponsored actual or de jure segregation.
No such excuse is on offer for these judges.
And I dare say, if the judiciary would tamp down its zeal to impersonate BOTH the legislature and executive, you may find elected officials throughout the country more willing and able to tackle and improve upon such conditions as were the subject of this latest unwarranted judicial intrusion.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseNot exactly judicially conservative, to say the least. If the current circumstances amount to unconstitutionally cruel and unusual punishment, then find it so. To prescribe and enforce activity is to steal legislative and executive power, and we are going to regret the practice. If California is in violation of a federal requirement, let the other branches of the federal government work out with California how to fix and enforce, if they will. If they won't, it is still only a poor excuse to seat all of government in the courts. Even if they are wise Latinas.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseWas there no other option - e.g., build more prisons? I know it may be impractical in terms of time and/or money, but I wonder but what logic the Court not only recognizes this as "cruel and unusual punishment" but also decrees that only prisoner release is an appropriate remedy.
Reply to this commentLinkReport Abuse@Patrick J: I've only skimmed the opinion, but from what I remember, the judges who issued the original decision believed that California *could* address the problem by building more prisons, but that it was unlikely to do so in anything like a reasonable amount of time, given its financial woes. (I suspect the judges would also argue that the new prisons would have the same staffing problems as the existing prisons.) I don't know enough about the situation to agree or disagree, but the judges (and justices) did consider this possibility.
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseThank you, Lorraine. I don't know if that makes their decision better, or worse, but it does answer the question!
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseDon't forget the illegal immigration/porous border issue: An estimated 25-35% of all CA prisoners are illegal aliens. This is a HUGE number of people who (a) are not supposed to be in this country at all, and (b) are dangerous criminals that need to be locked up lest they keep re-entering the country.
Given that there are ~120K prisoners in CA, that means that 30-40K are illegals -- exactly the number of prisoners that needs to be cut.
However, deport those low-lifes and they'll be back as soon as you can say, "ariba." The porous border and the utter destruction of the rule of law both at the border and once past it are the culprits here. Secure the border, enforce the law, and -- voila! -- CA's prisons won't be unconstitutionally bad.
Of course, are we going to pursue the common-sense solution of securing our borders so as not to spend tens of thousands of dollars housing and feeding Mexico's criminals? Certainly not in CA. They'll probably put them in the Governor's Mansion first. Thus do civilizations crumble...
Reply to this commentLinkReport AbuseEasy solution. Game show. Neon spandex. Rocket sleds. Richard Dawson.
Universal victory.
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