The cry of “systemic racism” in the criminal justice system continues to be heard. I remain unpersuaded that this empty phrase is correct or even modestly useful in either fixing the legal system or eliminating racism (which, as I’ve made abundantly clear, are two distinct problems that have been simplistically conflated). But since I may very well be wrong, I pay attention when people I respect have something to say about the point.

So when Reason held a debate between former libertarian Agitator Radley Balko against the Manhattan Institute’s Rafael Mangual, it was worth a listen. The issue was framed as “Is the Criminal Justice System Racist?” Continue reading →

His words were uttered at a time when the issue of consistency made not only different sense, but carried different meaning. They were thrown at me by a former federal defender, about to take his new job as a budding law prof, and he took comfort in the United States Sentencing Guidelines. This was jarring. When did the defense find the sentencing guidelines their friend?

It came in response to my “modest proposal” for crim law reform, that we roll back everything about the system, from laws to sentencing to police, to May, 1973. Oddly, no one either asked why May, 1973. But his response was surprising. Continue reading →

For some, watching statues destroyed pains our sense of history. Destroying historical artifacts has historically been viewed as a terrible thing, although at the time the mobs, marauders and righteous were certain they were doing the right thing, god’s work, and would be vindicated by history. Nobody seems to learn much history, which makes George Santayana sad.

But beyond the destruction of history, there is the broader random destruction following protests, riots and looting. Which act it involves tends to be a product of who’s asked, as vandals fail to see their acts of vandalism as vandalism, but rather as acts of protest and revolution. Continue reading →

In the aftermath of the Bubba Wallace noose outrage, where it turned out that the “noose” was there as a pull for the garage door, had been there for years before Bubba Wallace, who supported Nascar’s decision to ban the confederate battle flag from Nascar, was assigned to the garage, and reflected nothing about lynching. It was a good thing, that no one hung a noose in Bubba Wallace’s garage as a racist threat. But it was, as Wallace said afterward, still “a straight-up noose.”

In a world where the only point of reference is slavery and racism, a noose means lynching, and lynching means that horrific thing done to black people. Hanging had long been a means of execution having nothing to do with black people. Gallows have existed for hundreds of years before the advent of African slavery and continued after the emancipation. A noose can be about lynching black people, but neither the knot nor word is inherently about lynching black people. Continue reading →

Remember when the woke discussion at dinner was for parents to teach their boys to be girls? No more. There’s a new dinner conversation.

Ibram X. Kendi, author of the best-selling book “How to Be an Antiracist,” has compiled a reading list he calls a “step ladder to anti-racism.” It’s not enough to be “not racist,” he says, because it’s a claim “that signifies neutrality.“

“Those who are striving to be anti-racist realize it’s not an identity,” said Dr. Kendi, who is the founding director of the Antiracist Research and Policy Center at American University. “It’s something they’re striving to be, to be sure in each moment they are expressing anti-racist ideas and anti-racist policies.”

Continue reading →

I’m not brave, at least in the sense that others are. I’ve got nothing at risk. I can’t be fired or canceled, and so anything I have to say that fails to meet the approval of the unduly passionate has little risk associated with it. The same can’t be said for those who are willing to put their butts on the line, everything at risk as the bonfires grow larger.

Lara Bazelon, who called out Kamala Harris’ attempt to reinvent her “cop” reality so she could grift the progressives by being a black woman, was reduced to “that woman” by Harris as “tough interviewer” Anderson Cooper bowed and scraped to her holiness. When asked, Harris simply replied that it’s just not true, to which Cooper nods dutifully. Continue reading →

She works for the New York Times. She twits under the name Ida Bae Wells. And she won a Pulitzer Prize for making up a story that may be taught to your children, but just isn’t factually true. Her name is Nikole Hannah-Jones and she wants money.

It feels different this time.

And for the moment, it does. Hannah-Jones runs through the litany of black suffering, from being chattel to having a fraction of the accumulated family wealth. She offers studies to show that it’s not because black people are lazy or stupid, squandered their earnings or failed to put in the effort to achieve success. She offers other studies to show how racial discrimination has impacted black people to burden them, to cheat them out of their due, and then burden them some more. Continue reading →

What would you do if you were driving in your car and, without notice, found yourself surrounded by protesters? Suddenly, people you don’t know, who don’t know you, put their bodies in front of your car. Others started banging on your car. Some took objects and struck your windshield in an effort to break it. Your doors were locked, but people were trying to open them.

Your car was being demolished in front of your eyes. What would happen to you if this violent group managed to get into your car? Would they pull you out and beat you? Kill you?

There are some basic principles that apply under normal circumstances. You don’t do harm to a person in defense of property. Lives matter more than things. But then, why are these random people entitled to destroy your car because they’re enraged in general? And it’s not just property, but a step away from your life. Continue reading →

Ed. Note: This is a guest post by Roswell, Georgia, lawyer Charles Landrum.

As lawyers, words are our stock in trade. Words matter. Choosing the right words can make the difference between whether your client wins or loses, whether the judge grasps your argument in the first paragraph or tosses it onto the “denied” pile. And when drafting a motion, words are chosen carefully to avoid traps from—and sometimes to set them for—the other side. And words almost always are at a premium, with page limits constraining every choice along the way.

So I can’t help but analyze these three little words: black lives matter. Continue reading →

A young man who was so brilliant that he was admitted to the best tech university on Mass Ave. at 16 and had a Ph.D. in computer science on his wall by 24 was telling me about the difference between his life and his father’s. We’ve been talking about such things for years, as he comes for Thanksgiving and, sometimes, Christmas at my house. It’s not accidental. He’s another one of my sons.

There was a bidding war over him. He was being flown to interviews in a private jet, and these companies would have done damn near anything to prove their devotion, including mentioning salary packages with a lot of zeroes. You see, they wanted him. Bad. He’s black. He’s brilliant. And he was amazed at how things worked out for him. He told me his father couldn’t understand how it was possible, that they were throwing jobs at him, throwing money at him. He didn’t find it at all surprising.* Continue reading →