NCJ Number
168922
Date Published
1993
Length
13 pages
Annotation
Politicians, in an effort to appeal to their perceptions of the voters' viewpoint, have addressed the crime problem in America with harsh sentences and the placing of constraints on rights that they believe give offenders an advantage in case processing.
Abstract
Analyzing the principal anticrime proposals offered by Democrats and Republicans alike on the national level in 1991 and 1992 provides insight into how the public's concerns and fears about crime are handled by the politicians. Rather than offering the sort of encompassing view that a long and thorough study would provide, the parties produced ad hoc, stop-gap, sporadic measures that would make them appear to be tough on criminals. Regarding habeas corpus, which enables a detained or incarcerated person to challenge the legality of the custody, the Republicans would place a time limit on the right of appeal and would limit death-row inmates to only one appeal. There would be no review of cases held to have been "fully and fairly" considered by the State courts. The Democrats would limit death-row inmates to only one appeal. Further, law-and-order politicians have railed against the exclusionary rule as a "technicality" that allows criminals to avoid justice. The Republicans basically eviscerated the Fourth Amendment by allowing the use of evidence that has been seized "in good faith." The Democrats resorted to a reiteration of a court decision that held that police executing a legally obtained search warrant could introduce evidence even if it turned out later that the warrant had been faulty. Each political party in various ways has tried to outdo the other in pandering to the public's panic about crime. What is needed is a rational national plan that could flow from a presidential commission on crime.