Today is primary election day in 11 states. The WSJ has this rundown.
This blog is about criminal law and not politics, but the two cannot be cleanly severed. Elections have consequences. Will the next Congress be one where we worry about what damage Congress does, as we do with the present one, or where we look forward to opportunities to make things better, as we did in 1996? Will President Obama have a blank check to fill the federal courts with friends of murderers, as he is presently attempting in the Ninth Circuit, or will he have a Senate that he knows will only approve nominees showing some degree of moderation, as President Clinton had during most of his tenure.
In the states, will we have governments that swallow hook, line, and sinker the "smart on crime" mantra as they repeat the foolish errors of the Great Society, or will we have people who regard the academics and interest groups publishing agenda-driven studies with the proper degree of skepticism and who proceed on sentencing reform with the caution appropriate when innocent people's lives are at stake?
Stay tuned.
This blog is about criminal law and not politics, but the two cannot be cleanly severed. Elections have consequences. Will the next Congress be one where we worry about what damage Congress does, as we do with the present one, or where we look forward to opportunities to make things better, as we did in 1996? Will President Obama have a blank check to fill the federal courts with friends of murderers, as he is presently attempting in the Ninth Circuit, or will he have a Senate that he knows will only approve nominees showing some degree of moderation, as President Clinton had during most of his tenure.
In the states, will we have governments that swallow hook, line, and sinker the "smart on crime" mantra as they repeat the foolish errors of the Great Society, or will we have people who regard the academics and interest groups publishing agenda-driven studies with the proper degree of skepticism and who proceed on sentencing reform with the caution appropriate when innocent people's lives are at stake?
Stay tuned.
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