There is much more in the US Attorney General´s speech to the American Bar Association in August 2013 than the admission that too many Americans go to prison for far too long for no good law enforcement reason.
Saner approach to drug policy
Yes he will not use federal laws to attempt to trump state decriminalization of marijuana in Colorado and Washington. Yes he may be open to stopping federal harassment of laws that allow medical use of marijuana in 18 States. All progress unimaginable only two short years ago.
These are actions that save taxpayers money without increasing violence. Indeed, these smart actions are getting lots of encouragement, among others from the New York Times on saner approaches to drug laws and the Organization of American States that praised the reforms to the criminal justice system that will reduce use of incarceration.
A saner approach to criminal justice
But his speech was much bolder than media headlines on avoiding waste of criminal justice funds to control marijuana. It potentially shifts US federal criminal justice policy from earlier decades where it provided incentives to the states and local government to increase the use of incarceration to rates unimaginable in any other affluent democracy.
He admitted that US criminal justice may exacerbate ¨a vicious cycle of poverty, criminality, and incarceration¨. He referred to racial bias. Nevertheless, the Economist published the view that his ideas did not go far enough.
He did not say that too many young Americans are victims of too much violence because of too many failed policies. Nor did he directly say what he would do about these failures – remembering that the failure to reduce homicides and violence is a much bigger contributor to mass incarceration even than drugs.
However, juvenile justice commitments are dropping as fast as the arrest rates, as are jail populations in New York City. All showing that bringing rates of incarceration down to rates of the 1990´s is happening somewhere, some of the time.
A saner approach to preventing violence
But he did use ¨PREVENTION¨ in his vision of getting results for victims and avoiding waste to taxpayers. His speech was very much indicating prevention that is about protecting potential victims from violence. He recalled the need to look at ¨why young black and Latino men are disproportionately victims¨. He called attention to ¨violence spikes in some of our greatest cities. As studies show that six in ten American children are exposed to violence at some point in their lives¨.
He mentioned that the President had been a community organizer in South Side Chicago. He praised the ¨landmark Defending Childhood Initiative and the National Forum on Youth Violence Prevention¨. He will get every US District Attorney a Prevention (and Reentry) Coordinator! All vital steps in the right direction of adding effective prevention to law enforcement as a way to promote public safety.
But he is sitting on a gold mine that he did not mention. His department´s website on crime solutions and other sources of proven crime prevention strategies. There are also important guidelines from UNITY and the experience of Los Angeles, Minneapolis and other cities that have shown that violence in cities can be prevented from partnerships between police and social outreach that tackle violence at its roots, using a public health approach.
Saner ways of stopping violence against women
He drew attention to a startling statistic to most parents of university girls that one in four college women will be victims of sexual assault by graduation. Again he did not tell us what he would do, but his department´s website does, as do many experts. If every college and university adapted the proven practices such as 4th R and Green Dot that reduce this violence, university studying would be safer for women.
A Time for Public Safety Reinvestment
His speech makes a compelling case to shift federal funds from over-reaction against offenders to cost-effective prevention for victims. The White House has already promised investments in early education – $1 for $7 – and in school based substance abuse prevention – $1 for 18 . Why not $1 for $10 in juvenile delinquency prevention.
Think how many fewer (African, Latino, White …) Americans would be victims of violence, if the federal government moved to get results by investing in effective violence prevention and supported States that wanted to do the same. Think how many taxes would not be wasted.
Saner drug policies, saner criminal justice policies, saner violence reduction strategies – all smarter in protecting victims and avoiding wasted taxes – make way for Smarter Crime Control.
