The recent Forum story regarding North Dakota Attorney General Drew Wrigley’s effort to require mandatory minimum sentencing for gun related crimes included a cost projection by North Dakota law enforcement agencies. Wrigley indicated that the projection looked excessive and seemed aimed at undercutting his proposal, although he justified any additional costs by saying, “What is the price of public safety?”
The premise of Wrigley’s proposal is that longer sentences will make us safer. However, it is worth noting that our country, with less than 5% of the world’s population, has 25% of the entire world’s incarcerated population. One of the reason for this is simple: we lock people up for longer periods of times. Considering the wide-spread violence in the U.S. compared to other countries, it seems that longer sentencing might not be getting at the problem.
Of course, Wrigley’s proposal is directed at North Dakota judges. The implication: judges are making sentencing decisions which weaken public safety. He would be more convincing by identifying specific court decisions which demonstrate the need to limit the sentencing options of judges.
In any case, Wrigley’s proposals should not mask the reality that our ability to control gun violence has consistently been stymied by U.S. Supreme Court interpretations of the Second Amendment which completely ignore that the “right to bear arms” is predicated on being part of a "well organized militia.” Clearly, it is those interpretations which have produced the conditions for much of the gun violence around us. And, unlike most North Dakota judges, those Supreme Court judges cannot be voted out.
There is no doubt keeping people from using guns to commit crimes is an important goal, but we should be careful we are not offering solutions equivalent to Band Aids for brain cancer.
ADVERTISEMENT
Gerald B. Jacobs lives in Moorhead.
This letter does not necessarily reflect the opinion of The Forum's editorial board nor Forum ownership.
The Trust Project
