TheAgitator.com
Obama Pardon Tally: Flightless Fowl 1, Human Beings 0
Wednesday, November 25th, 2009Debra Saunders laments that 10 months into his presidency, Barack Obama’s first presidential pardon has gone to . . . a turkey.
According to political science Professor P.S. Ruckman Jr. of Rock Valley College in Illinois, Obama, a former constitutional law professor, has taken longer to use the executive pardon and commutation power than all but four presidents – George Washington, John Adams, Bill Clinton and George W. Bush.
Obama hasn’t pardoned a single ex-offender, even though about 1,200 people have asked for pardons because they have turned their lives around, expressed remorse for their crimes and now want to wipe the criminal slate clean of long-past offenses for which they paid the penalty.
Nor has Obama commuted the sentence of any of the 2,000 or so federal inmates seeking sentence reductions – many because of draconian federal mandatory minimum sentences.
Saunders notes that when he served in the Clinton administration, Obama’s Attorney General Eric Holder’s record with the pardon power was stingy, making exceptions of course for political patronage.
It’s telling that over the last three administrations, the one exectuvie power Clinton, Bush, and Obama have been reluctant to make broad use of is the one that grants clemency, forgiveness, and justice to the governed.
I do disagree with Saunders on one point, though. She writes:
Of course, the pardon doesn’t free anyone. It is a reward for reformed offenders who, after serving their sentences, have led exemplary lives and want a clean criminal slate so that they can vote or look for a job without revealing their past.
Forgiveness for contrite, admitted convicts has become the most common use of the pardon power. But it isn’t the only reason the Founders gave it to the president. It was also intended to be a last check against injustice. Here’s Alexander Hamilton defending the pardon power in Federalist 74:
The criminal code of every country partakes so much of necessary severity, that without an easy access to exceptions in favor of unfortunate guilt, justice would wear a countenance too sanguinary and cruel. As the sense of responsibility is always strongest, in proportion as it is undivided, it may be inferred that a single man would be most ready to attend to the force of those motives which might plead for a mitigation of the rigor of the law, and least apt to yield to considerations which were calculated to shelter a fit object of its vengeance.
Unfortunately, the pardon power is almost never used in this way. Unless you happen to be the former vice president’s former chief of staff.
Professor Ruckman, by the way, has a terrific blog dedicated solely to the pardon power.
Libby had his sentence commuted, not pardoned, no?
Turkeys are nasty, stupid birds. They deserve to be whacked and eaten.
Pardon me. I meant to post in another thread.
Is it just me, or does anyone else think that the power of the pardon should not be used in cases where the criminal is merely repentent and reformed? I don’t care that about that in the least! So he/she is a reformed criminal. So what? The power is such that it should not be used casually or for purely political reasons.
Any humans he eventually pardons will most likely be turkeys as well.
Anyone else except me getting an idea that Obama has a hard time reaching a decision……
Is his Executive inexperience showing?
I honestly don’t have a problem with the lack of pardons at the moment. My personal opinion is that the power should be used to correct a grave injustice, not give out a political handjob. If the president considered every pardon request from someone arrested 20 or 30 years for smoking a joint it would be his sole job.
I’m getting that impression myself. Not sure if it’s inexperience or simply JimmyCarterism.
I don’t blame Obama (in particular that is). The reality is that in our current political climate pardoning someone, even if it is the right thing to do, is not going to win you any votes and in some situations could probably cost you votes. That doesn’t make it a good thing but it’s hardly novel.
FDR gave out 3,687 pardons in his 12 years in office. Obama has a long way to go to catch up. He could follow JFK’s example of pardoning people convicted under the Narcotics Act of 1956 and free prisoners of the drug war. Radley, maybe you should call up Ronald L. Rodgers who holds the office of Pardon Attorney in the DOJ and ask him what he does all day.
Obama pardons a turkey.
I call that professional courtesy. ;)
“Radley, maybe you should call up Ronald L. Rodgers who holds the office of Pardon Attorney in the DOJ and ask him what he does all day.”
Will do. Just because I like not having my messages returned.
> If the president considered every pardon request from someone arrested 20 or 30 years for smoking a joint it would be his sole job.
Well (a) he had staff, and (b), there should be no need to consider those cases. If he actually cared about justice, possession-only cases would be automatic pardon grants.
Aaron,
If possession-only cases were an automatic pardon, the thugs that enforce those laws and arrest and prosecute people under them would just tack on additional charges, so as to make sure these people go to jail. You know, because they’re criminals and they’re bad!
Instead of making an automatic pardon, why not just tell his peeps to pass a law decriminalizing (or, better yet, legalizing) the possession, sale, and growth of MJ?
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