“Americans Voting Smarter About Crime, Justice At Polls”

The title of this post is the headline of this lengthy commentary by Radley Balko at The Huffington Post. Here are excerpts, which close with an especially interesting quote about folks inside the Obama Administration being surprised by some of the election day criminal justice outcomes:

A headline from the Denver Post this week read: “Colorado Drug Force Disbanding.” Another from the Seattle Times announced, “220 Marijuana Cases Dismissed In King, Pierce Counties.” Just 15 or 20 years ago, headlines like these were unimaginable. But marijuana legalization didn’t just win in Washington and Coloardo, it won big.

In Colorado, it outpolled President Barack Obama.  In Washington, Obama beat pot by less than half a percentage point.  Medical marijuana also won in Massachusetts, and nearly won in Arkansas.  (Legalization of pot lost in Oregon, but drug law reformers contend that was due to a poorly written ballot initiative that would basically have made the state a vendor.)

But it wasn’t just pot. In California, voters reined in the state’s infamous “Three Strikes and You’re Out” law, passing a measure that now requires the third offense to be a serious or violent felony before the automatic life sentence kicks in.  The results don’t negate the law, but they do take some of the teeth out of it.  And the margin — the reform passed by more than a 2-to-1 margin — has significant symbolic value.  Three Strikes was arguably the most high-profile and highly touted of the get-tough-on-crime policies of the 1980s and 1990s. It epitomized the slogan-based approach to criminal justice policy that politicians tended to take during the prison boom.

Eric Sterling served on the House Subcommittee on Crime in the 1980s.  Today, as president of the Criminal Justice Policy Foundation, he works to reform many of the laws he helped create. Sterling is encouraged by what he saw last week. “I definitely think we’re seeing a shift in the public opinion,” he says. “This election was really a game changing event.”…

But Julie Stewart, president of the criminal justice reform group Families Against Mandatory Minimums, remains skeptical. “I think it’s too early and too easy to say that the electorate has moved away from its love affair with punishment,” Stewart says.  “While it’s refreshing to know that voters in the initiative states understand that reforms were necessary and good, I hear from prisoners every day who are being sentenced to decades behind bars for nonviolent drug offenses.  We still have a very long way to go to reach the tipping point that will significantly change our national affection for over-punishment.”

Another reason for putting too much emphasis on the election results: Even if the public mood has shifted, Congress is usually way behind…. Politicians at the state and local level have been more willing to embrace reform.  Both Stewart and Sterling say that’s because they have no choice. “Governors need to balance budgets,” Sterling says….

Stewart says the right will also need to come on board before there’s any major changes to the federal system. “I don’t think significant reform could ever happen without conservative leadership,” she says. “The crack cocaine sentencing reforms of 2010 would not have happened without Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.) support….”

The one thing the 2012 results may do at the federal level is begin to convince some politicians that advocating reform is no longer political suicide.  “This year’s initiatives in California, Colorado and Washington do indicate a changed public perception about punishment and marijuana in those states,” Stewart says. “That should give legislators the freedom, if they choose to exercise it, to ease their tough-on-crime positions and not have to worry about surviving the next election.”

Sterling agrees. “I think it could give some cover to political leaders who already thought these things but were afraid to say them.  My contacts close to the Obama administration say they were really taken aback by the results in those states.  They didn’t expect the vote to be as lopsided as it was. I think they really don’t know what to do right now. But when medical marijuana first passed in California 16 years ago, you saw (Clinton Drug Czar) Barry McCaffrey preparing his counterattack within hours.  I haven’t heard of anything like that in the works this time around.  I think that’s a good sign.”