In his State of the Union comments on crime, President Clinton made some effort not to promise too much. Enforcing the law, as he doubtless knows, is largely a local responsibility, and even the most diligent work by police and prosecutors can have only a small effect on the crime rate.
He wisely stressed that in the case of crime, as in other social ills, our problems “are rooted in the loss of values and the disappearance of work and the breakdown of our families and our communities.” Until we address those underlying causes effectively, the battle against crime will not be won.
In the meantime, however, the voters demand action, and plenty of people in Washington are eager to give them what they want. The president offered a variety of crime-fighting measures, some of them modestly promising but at least one of them highly dubious.
His favorite proposal would provide funds to put 100,000 more police on the streets across the country. Although that number is exaggerated-only about 60,000 would be sworn police officers with the power to make arrests-it’s a step in the right direction.
So is the Brady bill, which would establish a national five-day waiting period for all handgun purchases. So are measures to outlaw a number of semiautomatic assault-style weapons. Clinton’s leadership on gun control is a welcome change from the attitudes of his immediate predecessors.
Clinton’s endorsement of the newly popular “three-strikes-and-you’re-out” policy toward chronic offenders is not such a great idea. For one thing, it indulges the fiction that fighting street crime is a job for the U.S. attorney. For another, its effect on crime would be minimal: The U.S. Sentencing Commission says fewer than 700 criminals a year would fall into the net.
The cost, on the other hand, would be anything but minimal: Keeping a 30-year-old behind bars for life would typically cost about $1 million. The money would go to keep criminals in jail even after they have gotten too old to be disposed to crime.
The president missed an opportunity to resist the congressional urge to create more and more federal crimes carrying heavy penalties-as reflected in 52 new death penalty offenses in the crime bill recently passed by the Senate. Almost all street crimes should be prosecuted by state and local authorities. Federalizing criminal offenses is a formula for swamping the federal courts, which are ill-equipped to handle the new responsibility.
Clinton sounded some worthy themes, and the measures he offered to combat crime are largely useful. The country, however, would benefit if the president not only proposed what needs to be done but opposed what doesn’t.
