In a free country, who gets to decide what religion is?
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The Wrong Way to “Protect” Neighborhoods
One of the consequences of treating drug addiction as a crime rather than a public health problem is the damage done to many urban neighborhoods. Current policies have made drug dealing a profitable venture, so it is not surprising that people…
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The Accidental Advocate
Governor George Ryan was a career politician dogged by accusations of corruption, a pro-death penalty Republican who inexplicably became a champion of abolition. What could account for his conversion? Could it be that, as Governor, he was forced to abandon ideology and confront the realities of capital punishment in America?
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We Always Pay the Piper
The picture of Timothy ‘Jake’ Laird stared out at me from page one of my morning paper–so terribly young, so much like the idealistic young criminal justice students in my classes. He was gunned down before he really had a chance to live, as much the victim of failed public policies as the man who pulled the trigger.
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Symbolic Justice
The opening salvos have been fired in the battle over Sandra Day O’Connor’s replacement, offering vivid, if disquieting, reminders of just how polarized America has become.
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