Everyone Is For Prison Reform by John Dewar Gleissner
Everyone is for prison reform... they just don't know it yet. People of all beliefs and philosophical stripes need and want prison reform in America. The Tea Party is against government spending and waste. Correctional expenses have grown exponentially over the last 50 years, crowding out educational and other worthy expenditures. Libertarians want more freedom and less government control over our lives. Prisons restrain 2.3 million Americans. Over 7 million are in the entire correctional population, which includes those on probation and parole and which would be our 13th largest state by population. America is supposed to be the land of the free, but we imprison a greater percentage of our citizens than any other nation in the world.
Republicans want to curtail welfare costs. Our prison and jail populations are the largest group of full-ride welfare recipients in the nation and cause welfare costs outside prisons and jails to increase. Democrats want to stop corporate welfare and help the poor. Corporations make record amounts of money to house and punish the idle, uneducated poor, while foreign manufacturers effectively take American jobs to foreign countries.
African Americans want freedom from discrimination, but a record number of African Americans are in prison or jail, and prisoners are legally barred from most private jobs in prison. Law enforcement officials seek to protect persons and property, but the illegal sale of drugs does not change after millions are convicted and incarcerated. Crimes occur in prison. The War on Drugs is far from victory, in part because we usually release the POWs, over half of whom become recidivists, proving the ineffectiveness of incarceration. Anti-gang activists want to stop criminal gangs; prisons give them new life. Public health officials stamp out communicable diseases; prisons provide breeding grounds for such diseases. The Christian and Jewish religions honor scriptures in which God proclaims freedom for prisoners, but freedom suffers. We eliminated or decreased more effective biblical punishments.
Those who preach inclusiveness in society are disappointed by the growing number of disenfranchised and unemployable pariahs carrying the "felon" label. We found strong evidence that marriages deter crime and that intact families are valuable, but we destroy marriages and families through incarceration. We gave up on rehabilitation, the original goal of the "penitentiary." The value of incapacitation - preventing criminals from committing crimes in the free world - is diminished by harmful effects in prison, inefficiency, and the economic, social and collateral costs of incarceration. Prisons make idle bad people worse and arguably more likely to commit crimes upon release. Recidivism rates remain high.
Economists say we need a maximum number of people working to improve our economy, but we send men and women to prison, where they are inactive and effectively unemployed. Official statistics inaccurately count this unemployment, painting too rosy a picture. Our young and able-bodied prison population grows while demographers point with alarm to the growing number of retirees relative to workers. Restitution for crime victims and child support goes unpaid when prisoners cannot work productively in private prison industries and cannot easily find jobs or housing when released. Many cry out for a balanced budget while we spend $150,000,000.00 per day just to keep prisoners alive. Over 100 years ago, prisons were profitable. We drop trade barriers with foreign nations, but preserve trade barriers against our own private prison manufacturers. Chinese prison-made products sneak into the United States easily; American prison-made goods cannot easily cross state lines. Goods now made exclusively overseas could be made in America.
The colorblind society we sought turned into new age slavery for African Americans and all races. We wanted smaller government and instead got bigger government with one new prison per week and massively increased expenses. America's correctional institutions, inefficiencies, expenditures and populations defy everyone. The money we spend, the lost opportunity costs and the collateral social damage caused by mass incarceration undermine America's standing in the world.
Everyone is for prison and criminal justice reform in America. When more of us realize the universal appeal of such changes, reform ideas will become reality.
Republicans want to curtail welfare costs. Our prison and jail populations are the largest group of full-ride welfare recipients in the nation and cause welfare costs outside prisons and jails to increase. Democrats want to stop corporate welfare and help the poor. Corporations make record amounts of money to house and punish the idle, uneducated poor, while foreign manufacturers effectively take American jobs to foreign countries.
African Americans want freedom from discrimination, but a record number of African Americans are in prison or jail, and prisoners are legally barred from most private jobs in prison. Law enforcement officials seek to protect persons and property, but the illegal sale of drugs does not change after millions are convicted and incarcerated. Crimes occur in prison. The War on Drugs is far from victory, in part because we usually release the POWs, over half of whom become recidivists, proving the ineffectiveness of incarceration. Anti-gang activists want to stop criminal gangs; prisons give them new life. Public health officials stamp out communicable diseases; prisons provide breeding grounds for such diseases. The Christian and Jewish religions honor scriptures in which God proclaims freedom for prisoners, but freedom suffers. We eliminated or decreased more effective biblical punishments.
Those who preach inclusiveness in society are disappointed by the growing number of disenfranchised and unemployable pariahs carrying the "felon" label. We found strong evidence that marriages deter crime and that intact families are valuable, but we destroy marriages and families through incarceration. We gave up on rehabilitation, the original goal of the "penitentiary." The value of incapacitation - preventing criminals from committing crimes in the free world - is diminished by harmful effects in prison, inefficiency, and the economic, social and collateral costs of incarceration. Prisons make idle bad people worse and arguably more likely to commit crimes upon release. Recidivism rates remain high.
Economists say we need a maximum number of people working to improve our economy, but we send men and women to prison, where they are inactive and effectively unemployed. Official statistics inaccurately count this unemployment, painting too rosy a picture. Our young and able-bodied prison population grows while demographers point with alarm to the growing number of retirees relative to workers. Restitution for crime victims and child support goes unpaid when prisoners cannot work productively in private prison industries and cannot easily find jobs or housing when released. Many cry out for a balanced budget while we spend $150,000,000.00 per day just to keep prisoners alive. Over 100 years ago, prisons were profitable. We drop trade barriers with foreign nations, but preserve trade barriers against our own private prison manufacturers. Chinese prison-made products sneak into the United States easily; American prison-made goods cannot easily cross state lines. Goods now made exclusively overseas could be made in America.
The colorblind society we sought turned into new age slavery for African Americans and all races. We wanted smaller government and instead got bigger government with one new prison per week and massively increased expenses. America's correctional institutions, inefficiencies, expenditures and populations defy everyone. The money we spend, the lost opportunity costs and the collateral social damage caused by mass incarceration undermine America's standing in the world.
Everyone is for prison and criminal justice reform in America. When more of us realize the universal appeal of such changes, reform ideas will become reality.
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