GOP leaders now getting what Mitt missed: drug war reform may make good politics (as well as being principled) for small-government conservatives

January 26, 2014

Two years ago, just when Mitt Romney was finally sewing up the Republican nomination and could pivot his campaign toward wooing general election voters, I wrote this post suggesting it might be shrewd for Romney to consider trying to appeal to independents, young voters and minorities by talking up sentencing and drug war reforms. I followed up these ideas via this April 2012 Daily Beast commentary suggesting Romney should consider embracing “what Right On Crime calls the ‘conservative case’ for criminal-justice reform, and in doing so appeal to groups of independent and minority voters (especially young ones) while demonstrating a true commitment to some core conservative values about the evils of big government.”

Two years later, it is (too) easy for me to assert that Mitt Romney might be preparing his own State of the Union address now had he taken my advice on this front. Nevertheless, I am hardly the only one who came to see that Mitt missed the boat with younger and minority voters. Romney himself commented that his campaign “fell short … in being able to speak openly and effectively to minority populations,” and this post-election post-mortem done by RNC Chair Reince Priebus highlighted that “young voters are increasingly rolling their eyes at what the [GOP] represents, and many minorities wrongly think that Republicans do not like them or want them in the country.”

These 2012 issues all came to mind again when I read this interesting new post by Alex Kriet over at Marijuana Law, Policy and Reform. The post is titled “More politicians backing marijuana reform,” and it notes that “the past few days have seen a number of prominent Republican politicians express support for easing marijuana laws.” Alex provides excerpts from recent comments by Governors Christie, Jindal and Perry and noted that they are “three Republicans rumored to be considering 2016 presidential bids [who are all] expressing support for easing drug laws.”

Of course, even among leading conservative voices, these three prominent GOP Governors are coming a bit late to the sentencing and drug war reform table. The Right on Crime movement has now been going strong for more than three years, with conservative stalwarts like Jeb Bush, Newt Gingrich, and Grover Norquist signing on to this statement of principles that “we must also be tough on criminal justice spending … [to reconsider our] reliance on prisons … [which can] have the unintended consequence of hardening nonviolent, low-risk offenders — making them a greater risk to the public than when they entered.” And, two of the most prominent elected Tea Partiers, Senators Mike Lee and Rand Paul, have been co-sponsors and prominent supports of bill to reform some of the harshest and most rigid aspects of the federal sentencing system.

Regular readers know I have long asserted that anyone truly and deeply committed to oft-stressed conservative principles of constitutionally limited government, transparency, individual liberty, personal responsibility, and free enterprise should be troubled by the size and power of modern American criminal justice systems, especially at the federal level. But Alex’s astute observation that many GOP leaders considered viable national candidates for 2016 are now talking up sentencing and drug war reforms suggests that Republican leaders are now getting what Mitt missed — GOP talk of serious criminal justice reform (especially at the federal level) may now be very smart politics as well as being in keeping with prominent conservative principles.

Some recent and older related posts: