Be wary of emotionally charged laws named after dead people
There’s an old adage in politics that says “it’s always better to do something than nothing.” One look at emotionally charged legislation like Kate’s Law, however, and that hackneyed phrase gets turned on its head.
Officially titled “Establishing Mandatory Minimums for Illegal Reentry Act of 2015,” Kate’s Law does exactly as its title suggests: It establishes a five-year mandatory minimum for illegal aliens who are deported and re-enter the country illegally, and 10 years for anybody who does it three times. Introduced after the tragic murder of Kate Steinle at the hands of an illegal alien, the law’s sponsors argue that it is the first step in preventing illegal immigrants from “preying” on American citizens.
In reality, it responds with draconian punishments to address a drastically-overstated problem.
Kate’s Law is only the most recent example of harmful criminal justice reform. In 1996, President Bill Clinton signed Megan’s Law. Introduced after the brutal rape and murder of 8-year-old Megan Kafka, the law mandates that law enforcement officials must make once-private sex offender registries public.
Like Kate’s Law, Megan’s Law takes a ham-handed approach to a widely misunderstood crime, broadly establishing ineffective limitations on individuals who very rarely commit again. And while it may seem intuitive to punish some of society’s worst criminals, using harsh measures on those who have already served their time has been proven to be wholly ineffective in combatting pediatric sex crimes.
Another example is Caylee’s Law. Named after the 2-year-old victim in the high-profile Casey Anthony case, the law establishes penalties for parents who fail to report their child as missing after a certain amount of time, depending on the state.
The penalty, which in most cases is a felony, is severe considering that most missing child reports are false alarms. In 2012, for example, there were 661,000 cases of missing persons, 659,000 of which (99.7 percent) were canceled quickly after they were filed.
Is a felony charge really appropriate for something that is so often nothing more than premature worry?
Criminal justice law has developed to the extent that almost every heinous crime is already illegal. And these new laws, which supposedly cover a gap in the penal code, more often than not address a specific situation as if it is part of a wider epidemic. Ted Frank, the founder of the Center for Class Action Fairness, put it well in his opinion piece, writing that “a crime or event that warrants a new law is by definition a rare occasion.” And citizens, in his opinion, should take action to limit these “apostrophe laws.”
But that isn’t to say that nothing has been done to solve the problem. In South Carolina, for example, the state Senate passed a law in early 2017 to ban the use of individual and animal names in bill titles. According to the state’s Senate Majority Leader Shane Massey, the law was passed because a name on a bill “adds an emotional aspect of the bill that really is a distraction from the merits.”
These examples are only a small sample of the destructive emotion-laden legislation in the books across the country. And while most are written with good intentions, their unintended consequences have evidently created more problems than they solve. To make room for knee-jerk emotional appeal, they have sacrificed substance and created legislation that is duplicative, draconian, wasteful ?? or all three.
In light of all this damage, it’s time for other states to follow South Carolina and say they’ve had it with legislating by anecdote. And it’s time for politicians to finally forsake the low-hanging fruit of emotional criminal justice laws and focus their time on the bigger issues of debt, entitlement reform, and healthcare. Our unforgiving economic and political climate demands it.
Noah Duell is a fellow in the Koch Fellowship Program.
Laws should never be enacted based on emotion but instead imperical evidence
They are based on emotion Karen. And people and families are being destroyed because of it. Mine included !
Same here Doug! All this sex offender crap has alienated me from not only my family but from people I had known for years and thought were my friends. Only to find out that they were subverting me any chance they could behind my back. Amazingly enough, no one has had enough balls to talk to me about my situation face to face. They just assume the worst and are too cowardly and two faced to ask me about it. It is pathetic how the masses are easily swayed by lies and propaganda. Hard to find people today that can think on their feet and see beyond what is on the surface.
I am on the Florida registry,which is for life, you can’t get off.The hysteria created by just the words ‘Sex Offender’ is so hard to deal with.Don’t get me wrong I know that there are animals out there that prey on the weak,These animals should not see the light of day again.But there are so many people out there that ‘yea’ it was a crime,but we paid for it,we served our time.Although we paid it’s never over,once you have been labeled a ‘sex offender’ you are forever a ‘sex offender’.With no attention paid to what your crime actually was,you are now and always a ‘sex offender’.
I’m stuck in that boat too. Sentenced to life on the shit list for something I did not do. It didn’t even matter that I have three Honorable Discharges from the U.S. Army. I protected women and children all my life. I hurt nobody .I attempted to hurt nobody. But I went from hero to zero over night. If the criminal “justice” system has their way. I’ll be on that list for life. I want my reputation and my rights back I earned them the hard way.
I understand exactly how you feel and what you and many of us like you in similar situations feel. I am an offender out of Florida but live in PA. Thank God that the PA Supreme Court ruled that SORNA is punishment and unconstitutional. Finally there are some cool heads prevailing and not afraid to make the right rulings. My point is that things can change over night. Never give up hope and keep doing the right thing. Eventually these laws will have to change on Florida too. Eventually people are going to get it that all these sex offender laws and registries are nonsense and do nothing to protect anyone. Just makes life very difficult for anyone that was unfortunate enough to wake up one morning to discover that they are now classified as a sex offender.
Don’t forget that males are just as susceptible to this sort of irrational emotional action.
John Walsh has made a career off his dead son. This trash enjoys his celebrity status and extended his 15 minutes to years manipulating others emotions having them relive this tragic event over and over and using others who had NOTHING TO DO WITH THE EVENT tormented and in many cases have been MURDERED THEMSELVES due to being on this very registry that this man has made a living advocating!
What a great way to have your son memorialized by tearing other families apart and making money off of it at the same time!!
Lee C
These emotionally charged people need to seek help and I mean professional help. If anyone has seen the 1981 movie Clash of the Titans you would remember in the scene where Calibos goes crying over to his statue mother Thetis saying “I demand justice” all because he lost his hand in fighting Perseus, and Thetis responded with “Justice or Revenge?”. Think about it!, these emotionally charged people crying out to their legislators for more justice and more strict SOR laws because they lost their love ones, and that “sex offenders are dangerous”, do they want justice or revenge? Maybe they need to think about what mistakes they could’ve made that led to that tragedy, however they need to learn to let their deceased loved ones go and learn to move on.
I question whether these feel good laws are well intentioned. Author Roger Lancaster: “Sex Panic and the Punishment State” explores the motivation of “moral entrepreneurs” pundits, politicians, victim advocates and others who seize on the climate of desperation and impulse for revenge which infects people’s thinking in a crisis atmosphere to pose sweeping and drastic solutions which favor their careers and enhance their status, or simply satisfy their craving to punish.
I’ve heard commenters assert that sex offender registration laws were well intended but it is likely that the motivation for these laws encompases a need to enlist post sentencing retribution disguised as public safety.