This is a phrase that needs to be jettisoned. Criminals never "pay their debt to society". Society is almost always left holding a sizable "debt" from a criminals activity. Families are never made whole when a loved one is murdered, a woman is never made whole after a rape, criminals rarely make restitution for theft ….and on top of all this, society has just written a sizable check to cover their incarceration for XXX number of months/year. I do believe criminals should eventually be able to EARN their way back in to full participation of society but only after demonstrating that they can be trusted with this responsibility and privilege. They haven't earned this or demonstrated this just because they served their penalty sentence. There should be a ramp/timeline that gradually reinstates their voting rights, and ability to run for office and even eventually makes the conviction non-public but I'm talking years, not months and certainly no voting while they are still in prison for goodness sakes.
I don’t want thieves or drug dealers or arsonists blighting the vote and I don’t care how long ago they did their time I defend these people and some of them turn things around but it is too expensive to create another bureaucracy to parse them all No vote for felons any time
Yeah. When you break the law to a certain degree, you have to accept that your participation in the government is gone. Especially in 2019, the stakes are too high. The government controls too much for people of questionable virtue to have a voice. That can sound like inequality or unforgiving. I am okay with that. The system is already so problematic. No need to introduce rapists, murders, swindlers, and extortionists into it. Wow. I look at that list. Sounds like elected officials.
As of January 2019, Iowa and Kentucky are the only two states with lifetime voting bans for felons, regardless of the crime committed.
We really don’t want criminals that struggle with bad judgment helping determine who our leaders are.
I35 is allowed to vote and his judgement is certainly questionable I see no reason a felon which has completed the requirements of their parole not be allowed to vote.
you see no reason, I talk to these critters every day and I hear plenty of reasons why they should have no say. People who can't spell JUDGMENT should not be allowed to vote. Or discouraged, anyway.
This an issue on which it shouldn't be too hard to find common ground. Obviously, Bernie Sanders's idea of bringing election booths into prisons is laughably moronic. However, should a felony conviction mean permanent disenfranchisement? I think a case can be made that that's an injustice at least in certain cases. What I could see being ok with is restoring voting rights if the felon serves his time, pays restitution to his victims, and stays clean for a certain period of time, and it could be a long time - maybe 10 years. If he does all that, I could be convinced to letting him vote.
Deez, your comments are reasonable and think many people would be open to the possibility. But it really isn't worth our politicians spending time on this. Our republic doesn't survive or crumble based on granting some felons the ability to vote. Also, there is the potential that once you get into negotiations the actual law becomes something no one really wants but gets voted in because of complicated political reasons. We need Social Security, Medicare, and Military spending relief. Knock a few important issues off the list and maybe it becomes worth spending time on.
I'm not saying it should be a high priority. I don't think it should be. I'm just saying that if people would play ball, something just could be done. However, my guess is that Democrats wouldn't go along, because the requirements are pretty onerous. They would get very few voters out of it.
I agree with your ideas, mostly. Go to Wal-Mart. Those people vote too. That's why we're in this mess. Bernie's idea is poppycock.
Morality-wise, ok. But rational voting habit-wise is the issue. Right now, we make it a lot harder for them to do so by excluding them from important parts of society even if they want to genuinely reform, which nudges people in the opposite direction of reforming.
True that. We already have enough trouble with non criminals who struggle with bad judgement voting democrat.
Well, there's a small piece of one that is the point of this thread. Focusing more on restitution for the victim and less on prison time (other than "this person is too dangerous to let back into society" as opposed to "they owe society in general a debt that can only be repaid by being locked up) would help even more, but that would require a huge cultural shift in thinking that may never happen.
Generally we lock people up to punish them, deter others, and protect the public. People talk about paying a debt, but that isn't what prison is about. What makes this hard is that to reintegrate people back into society, others (especially employers but others as well) need to be able to trust them - to show up, work hard, not steal, not hurt others. Well, if you've been convicted of a felony, there's a record of you showing that you likely aren't trustworthy at least in some respects. Of course, people do reform and deserve a second chance (with the exceptions of murderers, forcible rapists, kidnappers, child molesters, etc.). However, it's very hard to prove that someone has reformed, so society is reluctant to put them in positions of trust. That makes it hard for them to find work, make friends with decent people, start families, etc., which makes them remain outcasts and encourages them to go back to crime. People like to exploit this problem to support drug legalization (which I'm generally favorable to at least in some respects). However, if someone is busted for a drug felony, he wasn't just caught smoking a joint at a Willie Nelson concert. He was in possession of lot of weed, possession of something much harsher than weed, had a meth lab, or was a drug dealer. Do you want that guy working for you or marrying (or at least screwing) your daughter and making your grandchildren with her? Yeah, neither do I.
ok, let's create a new bureaucracy called the Department of Gently Nudging Towards Being Good Again and staff it with a few score thousands of psych majors and let them evaluate everybody in prison on an individual basis to see if they are ok to vote for Trump v Hillary. That will work just fine. And we can make Mexico pay for it.
At issue seems NOT to be those who are actually off paper but rather allowing those who are still subject to State control and scrutiny being permitted to vote. In MANY jurisdictions, voting rights are automatically reinstated once the term of supervision has expired... Also lost in the discussion is that only a small percentage of those who are released and complete the term of supervision actually manage to avoid a return to criminality.
Now, I don't want my kids to marry people involved in drug supply of any kind, but do you think there is a difference between weed dealer in Texas vs. weed dealer in Colorado? People making a lot of money in Colorado distributing and selling large amounts of weed. They are not felons. By the nature of their behavior are they untrustworthy in the subject of voting?
Has he fulfilled any parole obligations, let alone been parolled? Huisache wants a spelling test added to be able to vote, maybe a reading comprehension test may be more apt.
Folks, you all know that the Boston Marathon Bomber would only be allowed to vote under Bernie Sanders's goofy plan, right? So far, I haven't seen anybody here endorse that. In fact, I haven't seen anybody endorse that except Sanders.
I’m not the one that compared a felon’s judgment as the same as a non-felon’s judgment who’s ideology being different than yours.
Fair question. Like you, I wouldn't want my kids to associate with anyone in the drug business, so in that regard, I do hold a negative impression of anyone who sells pot, even if he isn't breaking the law to do so. Enough to disenfranchise that person? No. Enough to want him to stay away from my son or daughter (if I had one)? Yes. I judge a pot dealer in Texas differently, not because what he's doing is inherently worse but because he's willing to break the law and cheat in order to make money and serve his own interests. There's a reason why drug dealers, pimps, and dudes who sell electronics and jewelry out of their trunks aren't known for being strong family men. To me, that means there's also a reason to disenfranchise him at least temporarily.