This is the first comprehensive account of President Herbert Hoover's policies to reform federal criminal justice administration. Beginning with the first words in his inaugural address, Hoover informed the public that a high priority of his administration would be to insist upon reorganization, qualitative improvement, new efficiencies, and formal study of justice system organizations in the federal system. Calder examines Hoover's background and affinity for justice system reform, the campaign trail and crime control issues of 1928 and 1929, intellectual and practitioner resources, the Wickersham Commission, and the reforms of the federal law enforcement, court, and prison systems. Drawing upon extensive primary source collections, this book provides a thorough examination of the Hoover initiatives and assesses their impact on later federal policy. It will be of considerable interest to political scientists, social historians, and those involved in criminal justice programs.
Discusses federal initiatives for crime control and presents the argument that presidential and congressional initiatives are largely symbolic, in chapters that examine the anticrime policy agendas of Johnson, Nixon, Ford, Carter, Reagan, Bush, and Clinton. The final chapter provides information on President Clinton's anticrime agenda, as well as an analysis of the information presented throughout the volume. In this chapter, the argument is presented that most of the policies geared toward crime control are symbolic, providing no real benefit for reducing crime in the US. Annotation copyright by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR.
A comprehensive look at the beginnings of the current drug problems in the United States Federal Drug Control: The Evolution of Policy and Practice presents an overview of the key issues and key individuals responsible for the creation of the federal government’s efforts to control illegal drugs in the United States, from 1875-2001. The book focuses special attention on federal legislation that constructed the federal drug regulatory machinery and the Supreme Court cases that interpreted these laws and their implementation. An esteemed panel of scholars, including co-editor Joseph Spillane, author of Cocaine: From Medical Marvel to Modern Menace, and William B. McAllister, author of Drug Diplomacy in the Twentieth Century: An International History, traces the internal tensions between factions favoring medicalization and criminalization throughout the 20th century, examining the difficult choices that continue to be made in this ongoing debate. The central question in the government’s response to the crisis of illicit drugs in the United States has remained the same for more than 125 years: Should the government rely on educational and treatment programs or turn to the criminal justice system for answers? Federal Drug Control examines the historic turning points of the debate, including the 19th Century origins of the controversy, legislation and subsequent Supreme Court decisions in the 20th Century, international attempts at drug control agreements, and the emergence of new illicit drugs. The book also looks at the influential figures of the debate, including Levi Nutt, Lawrence Kolb, Richard Pearson Hobson, A.G. DuMez, and Harry J. Anslinger who ran the Federal Bureau of Narcotics (FBN) for more than 30 years. Federal Drug Control examines: the history of cocaine use in the 20th Century the history of marijuana use in the 20th Century the advent of psychotropic drugs in the 1960s the origins of the Harrison Narcotic Act the federal government’s efforts to limit the pharmacy profession’s control over prescription drugs and much more! Federal Drug Control: The Evolution of Policy and Practice is an essential resource for criminologists, historians, social historians, sociologists, anthropologists, public policymakers, academics, and anyone interested in the broad issues involved in how the federal government deals with the problem of illicit drugs in the United States.
Across America today gated communities sprawl out from urban centers, employers enforce mandatory drug testing, and schools screen students with metal detectors. Social problems ranging from welfare dependency to educational inequality have been reconceptualized as crimes, with an attendant focus on assigning fault and imposing consequences. Even before the recent terrorist attacks, non-citizen residents had become subject to an increasingly harsh regime of detention and deportation, and prospective employees subjected to background checks. How and when did our everyday world become dominated by fear, every citizen treated as a potential criminal?In this startlingly original work, Jonathan Simon traces this pattern back to the collapse of the New Deal approach to governing during the 1960s when declining confidence in expert-guided government policies sent political leaders searching for new models of governance. The War on Crime offered a ready solution to their problem: politicians set agendas by drawing analogies to crime and redefined the ideal citizen as a crime victim, one whose vulnerabilities opened the door to overweening government intervention. By the 1980s, this transformation of the core powers of government had spilled over into the institutions that govern daily life. Soon our schools, our families, our workplaces, and our residential communities were being governed through crime.This powerful work concludes with a call for passive citizens to become engaged partners in the management of risk and the treatment of social ills. Only by coming together to produce security, can we free ourselves from a logic of domination by others, and from the fear that currently rules our everyday life.
After decades of stability from the 1920s to the early 1970s, the rate of imprisonment in the United States has increased fivefold during the last four decades. The U.S. penal population of 2.2 million adults is by far the largest in the world. Just under one-quarter of the world's prisoners are held in American prisons. The U.S. rate of incarceration, with nearly 1 out of every 100 adults in prison or jail, is 5 to 10 times higher than the rates in Western Europe and other democracies. The U.S. prison population is largely drawn from the most disadvantaged part of the nation's population: mostly men under age 40, disproportionately minority, and poorly educated. Prisoners often carry additional deficits of drug and alcohol addictions, mental and physical illnesses, and lack of work preparation or experience. The growth of incarceration in the United States during four decades has prompted numerous critiques and a growing body of scientific knowledge about what prompted the rise and what its consequences have been for the people imprisoned, their families and communities, and for U.S. society. The Growth of Incarceration in the United States examines research and analysis of the dramatic rise of incarceration rates and its affects. This study makes the case that the United States has gone far past the point where the numbers of people in prison can be justified by social benefits and has reached a level where these high rates of incarceration themselves constitute a source of injustice and social harm. The Growth of Incarceration in the United States examines policy changes that created an increasingly punitive political climate and offers specific policy advice in sentencing policy, prison policy, and social policy. The report also identifies important research questions that must be answered to provide a firmer basis for policy. This report is a call for change in the way society views criminals, punishment, and prison. This landmark study assesses the evidence and its implications for public policy to inform an extensive and thoughtful public debate about and reconsideration of policies.
