First, it is important to understand that while many of our founders followed some tenet of Christian faith, they recognized the importance of maintaining a separation between religion and politics. By creating this separation between the Church and the Government, they were trying to ensure that certain religious tenets would not be the driving force behind the creation of legal codes. This common sense approach to religious tolerance in the midst of religious diversity showed a distinct maturity of thought. Their creation of the independent judiciary and their charge of it to ensure that the laws of the land were impartial to all, regardless of religion, was another stroke of genius on their part, and lucky for us. For in today’s religiously charged political and social atmosphere, such a foundation would not necessarily have been included.

Secondly, in order to fully appreciate the proposals that I am to set forth, it is absolutely necessary to recognize that our religious differences, while important to many, are not in themselves sufficient to create and enforce social norms or laws. In any government system that purports to recognize certain individual freedoms as innate and irrevocable, the freedom to worship a god of your choosing is just as important as the freedom to engage in certain behaviors that others may find reprehensible, so long as those behaviors do not present a danger to society.

And thirdly, since each of the worlds major religions profess to be the only true and accurate religion for humanity, it is wholly impossible for all of them, or perhaps any of them, to be one hundred per cent correct. Simply asserting that one’s own god is the true and only god does not make it empirically so, nor are the religious texts that accompany each religion and provide that religion with the rules of god able to be empirically attributed as having come from the mouth and mind of god itself. The mere fact that religious texts are filtered through the mouths and minds of men ensures that some distortions will be present and some prejudices included.

Morality then, in both a religious and legal form, is a kind of double-edged sword. As members of society, we can agree on the morality of certain acts and create laws to prohibit them. Such acts like murder, theft, and rape are moral issues that transcend most religious beliefs and can therefore safely be legislated. The Christian religion, or for that matter the Jewish, Muslim, Buddhist, Hindu, or any other religion, does not have any sovereign claim to these kinds of moral issues, as they are readily accepted by most of humanity as being wrongful acts that need to be outlawed. But other beliefs and actions are not universally held, and therefore can’t be legislated without trampling the freedoms of others, despite the perceived religious prohibitions against them.

In accepting these facts, we can only conclude then, that any laws that reflect moral judgments other than the ones overwhelmingly accepted by a near universal majority should not be included into our legal codes. So, in creating a society that respects individual choice and freedom of expression, it is imperative that we agree to remove certain behaviors beyond the reach of legal justice and instead agree to disagree on their eternal consequences, if any exist at all.

Before I go on much further, let me make clear that I am not decrying the role of religion in our world, nor am I implying that our laws have no basis in religious history. To do either of those things would assure you that you should read no more of what I have to say because I would clearly be a fool. Religion, of some kind, is one of the few, near universal conditions of mankind. To deny its role in the daily lives of people is ridiculous. Many hundreds of millions seek and receive some kind of guidance and comfort through the practice of their religious beliefs. But these beliefs should continue where government ends, providing answers to eternal questions and providing spiritual relief when there is little in the physical world. In fact, it is these very aspects of religion that make it such a varied and complex system. And that complexity assures that society will never see eye to eye on certain behaviors. But rather than criminalize these behaviors, we should work together to minimize those behaviors that offer the greatest possibility of individual harm; rather than legislate with religion, we should educate with facts.

As such, it is time to take religious based morality out of the political equation. Our country is not a theocracy, nor was it intended to be one. We have enough to agree on, and enough to improve upon, that to waste our time on bitter debates about personal behavioral matters serves no purpose other than to allow ourselves to be divided unnecessarily and to keep the politicians wheeling and dealing out of sight. But agreeing to take these issues off the table, so to speak, is not to abandon your own personally held beliefs. I think that everyone should be encouraged to believe in their religion, to practice their religion, and to teach their religion to their children and others who are interested. But this does not mean that your religion should become governmental rule. We have to accept the fact that everyone doesn’t believe in all the same things, and that it is these differences that should be most respected, so that your beliefs are respected in kind.

With those thoughts in mind, my next several essays will examine the impropriety of the current illegality of drug possession and use, prostitution and consensual adult sexual behavior, gambling, suicide and euthanasia, homosexuality, and abortion. I will explain why our government has no need to insert itself into these types of behavior, except where they infringe upon the safety or financial security of society in general. Further, I will show how the current imposition of laws in these areas needlessly expend tax resources that could be better spent to promote general social welfare or reduce the public tax burden.

In so doing, I am in no way attempting to altar your own personally held religious views on these issues. Rather, I am asserting that your religious views, even if shared by thousands of similarly minded people, can not be forced upon the public simply because your holy texts say they should be. To do so would be a total contradiction to the freedoms guaranteed in our Constitution and conveyed upon all citizens, regardless of their religious beliefs or lack thereof. This doesn’t mean that there shouldn’t be guidelines for public behavior, and some consequences for individuals who allow their personal peccadilloes to become public hazards. We should have some rules regarding proper conduct in public. But if we really want to move forward and repair the rift in our country we must remember these rules first: Do unto others, as you would have them do unto you; and, live and let live. Meaning, if we can’t overwhelmingly agree on whether a moral should be law or should remain in the religious realm, we shouldn’t be too quick to force our religious beliefs on the rest of society.

Unfortunately, in our legal system today, civil matters often fall to the wayside when it comes to getting their fair day in court. Because our criminal courts and civil courts are combined, and because criminal matters are tantamount to keeping society safe from abhorrent activities, civil matters often get pushed to the end of the line when it comes to getting them resolved in the court system. The result is a multi-year process for resolving civil complaints, driving up the costs for individuals and delaying disposition of the matter at hand. This frustration can lead to individuals taking matters into their own hands, creating the potential for civil matters to turn into criminal matters. This is a cycle that has to come to an end.

Just to be clear, when I refer to “civil justice,” I am talking about things like contract law, property disputes, product liability, family issues, community ordinances, building codes, malpractice, and other activities not specifically covered by misdemeanor or felony criminal codes. These are the kinds of legal issues that ordinary people deal with when they encounter the court system. But because of the structure of our civil court system, individuals that attempt to right a wrong against them are faced with an astounding challenge, both financially and legally. Our civil codes are filled with nuances of procedure that enable lawyers and large, financially secure corporations to draw out the process and essentially bleed an individuals ability to gain justice by driving up costs. This creates an inequity in the system that is supposed to be available to all citizens. Further, the number of questionable legal suits brought into the system by citizens and businesses needlessly clog the courts, creating a backlog too large to get through in a timely manner. Justice should be fair and efficient, or it is hardly just at all.

So what can be done to make our civil justice system more responsive to the needs of society? The first step would be to establish two layers of civil justice: one layer that deals with disputes between individuals only, and another that handles any disputes involving businesses and government. The need for this is simple; individual disputes are often less complicated to resolve, and therefore don’t require all of the accoutrements of a full-blown legal trial. Rather than be held hostage to expensive attorney fees, overbooked court calendars, and endless delays, personal civil disputes could be remanded to binding mediation, similar to what is available in many areas today, but with a few changes.

This type of mediation would be required for any disputes that could result a possible financial reward under a defined dollar amount or to resolve other, non-financial problems. A three-member panel of ordinary citizens who serve in that capacity for a defined length of time, and then are rotated out and replaced (similar to convening a jury pool) would hear disputes. Each party would represent themselves at mediation and agree to be bound by the panel’s decision. Panels could be established based on population numbers so that there would be plenty available to handle disputes in a timely manner. This would allow for all citizens to have access to mediation for minor civil disputes without having to pay high court costs, filing fees, attorney fees, or having to wait for an extended amount of time for redress. Decisions would be final, eliminating endless appeals and allowing people to move on with their lives.

In addition to speeding up the process for resolving minor disputes between individuals, binding, mandatory mediation would result in lower overall costs associated with the legal system, and greater participation of the citizenry in the legal process, furthering each persons understanding of the necessity of involvement with societal needs.

For civil matters involving businesses, government, or for individual disputes with a higher potential financial reward, civil courts should be established that are independent of the criminal court system. This is necessary to increase the speed with which these kinds of disputes can be resolved and thus avoid the high costs associated with these types of trials. Like the criminal court system, civil courts can be established at the state and national levels, housed in the same buildings, and sharing the same procedural guidelines. The state courts would be responsible for solving disputes between parties residing in the same state, while the national courts would work on matters that involve parties from different states. A national set of procedures and rules would govern how the courts would operate.

In order for this type of division to work, national civil codes would have to be enacted, similar in nature to the national criminal code, so that every citizen, business, or government entity would understand what kind of conduct was acceptable and what would likely result in being brought to court. Unlike our current cadre of civil codes, these would not vary from state to state, but would be consistent throughout the country, except in cases where geographical concerns dictated slightly different policies, with similar restrictions regarding what constitutes illegal civil conduct. Further, appropriate guidelines for jury awards should be developed to put an end to outrageous awards that tend to get passed on to the public through higher costs. Finally, any type of pre-trial settlements involving product liability, malpractice, or governmental misbehavior should be made public to prevent the same actions from occurring over and over again. Privately made back room deals should not be allowed, preventing non-disclosure contracts that keep the public from being aware of potential problems resulting from poorly made products or policies.

While it has become commonly accepted that the only way to get someone’s attention is by hitting them in the bank account, civil justice should not be viewed as some sort of lottery pool, whereby individuals can strike it rich by claiming damages or concocting dubious claims. Verifiable economic damages should be shown before awards are handed out. Potential economic damages should be based on statistical averages based on the harm done and the loss of potential economic earnings, if appropriate. Intangible damages should be handled in other ways if possible. More importantly, parties on the losing end of civil trials should be made to rectify their errors by correcting the problems that led to the court action. They should be held accountable for repairing and replacing the faulty products, rewriting poorly thought out policy, or standing by their written contractual agreements.

The final piece of the puzzle concerns the legal profession itself. Rather than act as public servants, lawyers have gotten a negative reputation by reaping in more than they recover for their clients and by elongating the legal processes in order to drive up billable hours. The whole point of having legal representation is so that individuals don’t have to learn all the fine points of law in order to stand up for themselves. Simplifying the codes would go a long way in eliminating this problem, but so would limiting the amount of a winning party’s award that a lawyer could claim. This is not to say that attorneys should work for free, but as an integral part of the justice system, they have a duty to advocate for the individual more than they have a right to get rich.

The integrity of the justice system depends on its opacity and its ability to produce equal justice for all parties involved. It should operate on the least amount of money possible while maintaining its integrity as a bastion of truth and honor. In any democracy, the rule of law is one of the pillars of strength by which that democracy will stand or fall. If society can’t look to its justice system and feel confident that anyone, at anytime, can find recourse within it, then it is a broken system and could lead to eventual mayhem. We are edging ever closer to a system that is jaded and increasingly viewed with suspicion. This is not justice at all.

To begin with, it is important to recognize the fact that current legal codes are often infused with religious morality issues that are not equally recognized by all individuals and not evenly applied to all citizens. This almost guarantees that our laws create criminals simply by the fact that they exist as laws. Any national or state legal code should reduce the number of criminal acts to include only those acts that are nearly universally accepted as harmful to others, regardless of religious or personal spiritual beliefs. Such acts would be clearly accepted and recognized by all citizens as just laws enacted to reduce instances of harm to others or society as a whole.

Such acts as have been described in previous essays would include the obvious crimes of murder, rape, robbery, assault, destruction of property, destruction of the environment, fraud, kidnapping, counterfeiting, bribery of public officials, immigration violations, and the willful disregard for the safety and well-being of others. We have laws dealing with all of these actions now, and it is hard to argue that the existence of these laws is anything but just. Still, there is room for reform within these laws that can lead to their being strengthened to better protect society and hopefully reduce the frequency of their being ignored.

Take our laws against murder, for example. It is widely accepted that the action of ending the life of another person is a criminal act in all cases except for self-defense or during the execution of legal military operations. But, in an effort to account for the variety of ways in which a person can end another’s life, we have created laws that include varying degrees of murder, each with different penalties ranging from a death sentence to less than a year of incarceration. This system can be manipulated in such a way as to appear to lessen the severity of the act of murder from one of depravity to one of mere carelessness. Society is not better protected from those who would commit murder by having such divisions in the legal code, but rather the criminals are insulated from the seriousness of their actions.

I use murder as an example to demonstrate a point. Murder, or the ending of another’s life, is usually considered to be the worst of all possible crimes. The horror it brings to the victim and the pain it unleashes onto the victims families is among the hardest to imagine. How then, can the taking of another’s life have different degrees of depravity? To me, it is irrelevant whether a murder is planned in advance, occurs during the commission of another crime, or is the result of completely irresponsible and thoughtless behavior. A life is still extinguished, a family is still left behind, a child may grow up without their parent, or a mother may bury her own child. Murder, unlike accidental death (which can occur through acts of natural disaster, medical complications, or unforeseeable chain reactions), can be avoided simply by not killing someone or by not performing acts that could reasonable lead to someone getting killed. As such, murder laws should be reformed to include any act that causes the death of another person through negligence or by purposeful design. The only exceptions for taking another’s life would be instances of actual self-defense, where your own life, or that of another, is in danger of being taken. Period.

Similarly, the legal codes for rape or sexual battery, serious assault, willful destruction of the environment, and kidnapping, among others, should be rewritten to exclude the various levels of severity, as these crimes reduce the security of society in addition to irreparably harming the victims of those crimes. By eliminating the different levels of criminal severity, society would be sending a message that these kinds of acts are intolerable and would receive the harshest punishments. There would be no wiggle room for the convicted criminal to move away from the consequences of their actions, and could result in less instances of these acts occurring.

Some criminal behavior though, can be stratified, depending on the amount of harm that is actually done. Non-violent criminal acts such robbery, destruction of property, fraud, immigration violations, counterfeiting, and bribery are not all equal in nature and so some classification is in order. Still, these crimes are anti-social by nature, and demand to have their place in any criminal code that is established. And, as they are all serious in nature, in that they affect a persons financial livelihood or society’s stability, they should be limited in their classifications to just a very few divisions, based upon either the value of the financial destruction or the amount of societal upheaval that results in their having been committed. These divisions would determine whether an individual would be tried under the national laws, state laws, or in some cases of minor petty theft or property destruction, at the local level.

Absent from a revised legal code would be any restrictions on how individuals treat their own (non-living) property or their own bodies. This would necessarily include laws that prohibit voluntary use of drugs or alcohol (unless their use results in harm to someone other than the user), laws pertaining to consensual sexual activity between adult individuals, suicide laws, and laws that mandate specific personal safety requirements. These kinds of laws are established not so much in an effort to keep the whole of society safe, but rather to regulate behavior that is morally objectionable to certain portions of society or to save society money by reducing instances of physical harm to the individual. Rather than create established legal codes to prohibit these behaviors, society can reduce their instances through honest educational efforts about the possible harm that can occur to individuals engaging in these behaviors. Further, certain legal waivers and restrictions can be created that will release society from incurring the costs that may occur when these behaviors lead to individual harm. Citizens wishing to engage in these acts would have to take full responsibility for any harmful individual effects that may result due to their participation in these activities. Society should also establish stiffer than normal penalties if citizens engaged in possibly self-harming actions commit of an actual crime.

All other acts not established as national or state crimes would necessarily fall into the category of misdemeanor, civil violations, or non-criminal, and could be amended by future generations.

Such a common sense approach to creating laws would have several benefits to society: reduction of confusing criminal code and streamlining existing violations; better enforceability of the crimes that remain; reduced costs for enforcement by redefining what constitutes criminal behavior; and a consensus regarding criminal behavior versus non-criminal behavior.

The actual revision of the legal codes can’t possibly be discussed completely in just one essay, but I think that the basic tenets for reform are here. Common Sense should be the hand that guides the reform movement when making the actual changes. And it is important to remember that we are only discussing criminal legal code in this essay. Other legal codes have to exist to regulate civil behavior of corporations and individuals that provide a basis for non-criminal public conduct in order to ensure that the needs of society are met, but these too should be limited in scope. Reformation of the civil justice system will be the topic of my next essay.

Human nature being what it is, it is inevitable that some people will engage in criminal acts. The reasons that drive an individual to crime are many and varied, and I won’t pretend that all circumstances are the same for all criminal offenders. That said, I am prepared to make a sweeping generalization in an effort to categorize criminal behavior in order to better explain how we can more effectively use our criminal punishment system to help deter would-be criminals and to help protect the needs of society.

In the simplest terms, criminal behavior can be partitioned in this way: petty crimes that create a public nuisance that do not directly harm other individuals, but have the potential to harm others or the shared elements of society, and are committed thoughtlessly but not maliciously; serious crimes that are intended to or do cause harm to another person, their property, or the property of society committed out of personal vengeance or for financial gain, whether premeditated or not; and depraved acts against society that cause irreparable personal injury or death, harm the structure and safety of society on a local or national level, or that erode the basic principles of democracy and freedom for personal power and gain, whether premeditated or not. Using these definitions, it becomes easier to establish appropriate punishments for criminal behavior.

The Constitution recognizes two basic forms of punishment in Article VIII of the Bill of Rights, but does so in a way as to restrain society from over-punishing convicted individuals.

Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted.

This short sentence has be redefined many times over the years as society’s ideals have shifted and as the legal code has become more complex, and I think that the authors of that document meant to leave this area open to some interpretation by future generations. They seemed to recognize the fact that what may be considered excessive or cruel in their day might not be applicable to future citizens. In the mid and late 1700’s, it was not unheard of for convicted prisoners to be impoverished, drawn and quartered, burned to death, or other such punishment in accord for their crimes. They realized that these types of punishments, when meted out by society, were not so much a deterrent to crime, but rather a reflection of the crimes back onto society. That sentence tried to establish the concept that effective punishment was one that was commensurate to the crime and that anything that moved beyond that threshold would be unbecoming of a society that established itself on the doctrines of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

But I further believe that the Founding Fathers did not include this Article in the Bill of Rights in an effort to over-protect those people who do commit criminal acts. Indeed, the individual rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness are directly affected by the guaranty of society’s right to safety, and those who stray beyond the laws must be held accountable in order that others can pursue their happiness without fear of harm. Common Sense requires nothing less than the administration of effective punishment for criminal offenders that enables the offender to either be rehabilitated and returned to society as a productive, contributing member, or to be removed from society completely so as to never threaten the security and stability of others again or drain the financial resources of public funds.

If you look at our punishment system today, you will notice a high rate of recidivism for criminal acts coupled with a low rate of rehabilitation and an even lower rate of societal protection. You will notice large disparities in the application of punishments that dilute the desired effects of keeping the worst criminals out of society while reforming those who can be redirected back into the mainstream. And you will see a system that is expensively wasteful, unmindful of rehabilitation, skewed in favor of the convicted criminal’s comforts and desires and less concerned about reducing crime. Criminal punishment in our politically correct world today is not so much about protecting society and reducing crime as it is about creating a self-perpetuating money trough and feel good atmosphere among criminals while leaving innocent citizens to fend for themselves.

One of the most basic needs of human beings is the need to be accepted by others, so surely the lack of acceptance brings about some kind of negative feeling. Conversely, the conveyance of acceptance allows the receiver to bask in the approval of his peers and promotes similar behavior that allowed for such praise to be given. If this is true, then one of the most valuable tools in preventing recurring criminal behavior is easily, and inexpensively, available to society. Plainly said, it is time to return the concept of public shame to our criminal punishment system. Psychologists will decry this type of punishment at least as cruel, because they are enamored in their beliefs that individual psyche’s are more frail that even the thinnest crystal glass. On the contrary, if properly applied, bestowing shame on individuals for petty level crimes could have a great impact on the incidence of occurrence.

Currently, punishments for petty level crimes often take the form of monetary fines, community service and/or some kind of “counseling.” These punishments have not proven to be very effective in reducing these kinds of crimes simply because there is no longer any sort of negative stigma associated with committing these petty level acts. Paying a fine doesn’t mean much to people who can afford a few hundred dollars whenever they choose to behave poorly. Community service can be too easily turned into something that the offender would normally be doing in the course of their daily life, and counseling is usually just another way for the court system to levy fines without assuring that behavior has been effectively changed. Past societies understood the need to infuse elements of public scorn into their punishments as a way to affect an individuals desire not to repeat that action. These punishments could be limited in scope and combined with elements of monetary fines and verifiable, but free, courses aimed at identifying the offending behavior and learning how to reduce it. At the conclusion, the offender would be received back into the good graces of the community without prejudice and the incident forgotten.

Serious crimes require more serious punishments including a period of probation, incarceration, and restitution to their victims. While in prison, convicts should be required to work at an occupation, so that they have a skill when they return to society. Convicts should be required to take courses on societal expectations and behavior modification. They should be required to give public addresses regarding their crimes, and upon their release should experience a similar shunning procedure by their community. Upon completion of their sentence, they too should be publicly welcomed back into the community or established into another. Because these crimes are more serious in nature than petty crimes, a convicted individual who recommits should have their sentences increased proportionally, including, eventually, their permanent removal from society.

The worst of the criminal offenders are those who cause irreparable personal injury or death, harm the structure and safety of society on a local or national level, or erode the basic principles of democracy and freedom for personal power and gain. Not all of these acts are of a physically violent nature, but still demonstrate a lack of societal involvement to the point of indifference, enabling the offender to feel no remorse and thus be likely to commit similar acts in the future. For these individuals, a lengthy incarceration is probably the most non-cruel method of punishment. The seriousness of their crimes should guarantee that they be removed from the public for some time. Along with many of the techniques described above, upon their potential release, these offenders should be required to register their crimes with a national registry that could track their locations and occupations throughout the country.

For some criminals though, lengthy prison sentences often enable convicted individuals to continue to inflict misery on society. These people commit the worst crimes of humanity and once committed, cannot be made up for. Why then should we as a society, as taxpayers, continue efforts to house and feed and educate these monsters among us? A more effective punishment for these criminals, and a more palatable one for society, would be banishment. Better than the death penalty for it doesn’t kill in the name of justice. Better than life in prison because it doesn’t drain the tax coffers. Better for society in that we know the criminal is out of our midst forever. Our national justice system could establish a penal colony of sorts on one of our many bombed out Pacific Atolls. Construct simple shelters, provide a few transports a year of basic supplies, and then forget about them. This final and total act of non-acceptance might be enough to make a few individuals think twice before plunging off the deep end.

The effects of adapting some of these changes into the punishment could result in the reduction of criminal behavior both through stronger social deterrents and more standard, equally applied punishments. The cost savings could be substantial through the decreased need for short term and permanent incarceration and their associated expenses. The increased safety to society procured through the permanent removal of the most villainous of criminals is nothing less than society deserves. And they reflect society’s desire not to inflict excessive, cruel, or unusual punishments on offenders or itself.

The last step in reforming the criminal justice system involves the revision of the legal code itself. Those thoughts in my next essay.

With the establishment of the three-tiered enforcement system, we will have created three different levels of offenses. As such, it is appropriate for each level (Federal, State, and Local) to maintain it’s own judicial system. That does not mean that each level needs to operate by different procedures or be bound by different basic principles, but rather that each tier be responsible for trying those offenders who fall within its jurisdiction. As with the combined Justice buildings, Federal and State criminal courts could operate out of a single court complex, while the local courts could preside in multiple local locations. Again, this consolidation of physical locations combined with a central resource and depository center would result in lower costs and improved efficiency.

The Constitution describes many protections for us, as citizens, if we are suspected of having committed a crime. We are protected from police searches without a legal warrant; we are protected from prosecution without a legal indictment; we can not be tried twice for the same crime if we are found not guilty in the initial trial; we can not be compelled to testify against ourselves; we have the right to a speedy trial; and we can not be fined excessive fines or bail, or be subjected to cruel and unusual punishments. The Constitution provides for the protection of the accused and convicted, yet it remains curiously silent about the rights of society in relation to the rights of the convicted. The right of society to be safe from criminal individuals should be greater than the rights of a convicted offender. This is where the system begins to break down.

Rather than be the final stop in the search for truth, our courts are often anything but. Instead, they have become a place of obfuscation, where the truth often runs second fiddle to the games and guiles of the attorneys and judges who seek to increase their reputations rather than protect the public and who engorge their wallets through endless litigation. Evidence that is relevant to a case if often excluded, while inconceivable defense theories are thrown about as facts. Defendants are portrayed as victims of society rather than as individuals responsible for their own actions and procedural errors can convict an innocent man or set a guilty man free. Too often, trials turn on twists of emotion instead of factual evidence.

Prior to taking any case to trial, defendants should be given an opportunity to view the evidence against them and to present their side of the story in what would amount to a short mini-trial. Many suspects, once confronted with an abundance of actual evidence, will admit to their guilt. These individuals should be immediately taken into court for sentencing procedures. Designated courts at each level would have this as their primary task. This would allow for other cases to move more quickly through the system. For those cases where the suspect denies guilt, certain rules and procedures could allow for trials to move more quickly and factually through the courts.

First, juries should be seated randomly, with the least amount of pre-examination possible, so that attorneys on either side can’t “stack the deck” in their favor. To achieve this, jury service should be nearly impossible to shirk, with illness of a juror or their family member, unavoidable, verifiable travel commitments, or severe financial hardship being among the only reasons for postponing a juror’s service. Jurors should not be asked questions about moral beliefs or leanings, because like it or not, we all have them to one degree or another, and if a jury is to made up of common citizens, then pretty much anyone can do the job. Finally, juries should be required to determine only the guilt or innocence of a defendant. The punishments for most crimes should be posted with the laws themselves, and again when the charges are brought forth. This would allow for jurors to focus more on the evidence at hand without having to worry about how to sentence a person they may find guilty.

With recent leaps in forensic technology, there are many more tools available today for determining probable guilt or innocence of a defendant. Based on sound scientific principles, prosecutors are now able to identify DNA evidence at many of the most violent crime scenes. They have the ability to reconstruct crimes to determine what took place. The prevalence of surveillance cameras catch many criminals in the act of committing a crime. Financial trails can be traced, fingerprints can be identified, and weapons can be tested and matched to violent acts. All of these techniques, when used properly, can help to confirm a defendant’s innocence or guilt. Our reorganization of the investigative arm of criminal justice would help to ensure that these tools would be used in a consistent manner and that their findings would be accurate. If prosecutors can provide several examples of forensic evidence that can be verified and irrefutably bind a defendant to a crime, then this evidence should be accepted as factual and not be rebutted as voodoo science. This acceptance would end the need for “expert witnesses” who appear at a high cost to both the defendant and the public, but who serve to confuse juries by challenging accepted science.

If forensic evidence should be accepted as fact, as described above, then eye-witness testimony, unrecorded conversations, individual perceptions, and investigative suppositions should be introduced not as fact, but as helpful, though not necessarily accurate information that helps to build motive and means. Such circumstantial evidence is the common sense that explains the existence of the forensic evidence. It is with this evidence that defense arguments can and should be directed. It is in this area of testimony that a defense lawyer can foment the most uncertainty in the minds of jurors. Reasonable alternative explanations should be given whatever value they deserve when compared to the life experiences of the jurors and any relevant information about the defendant’s normal activities.

The trial system could be further streamlined by reducing the amount of backroom sparring that occurs and often prolongs a trial. While often done by the defense, prosecutors are known to engage in these tactics as well. Much of these arguments concern the admissibility of evidence. By adopting the rules of factual evidence and subjective evidence outlined above, such discussions could be greatly reduced. Further, adoption of these rules could also lead to a decrease in appealable issues after conviction, again reducing the workload in our courts and reducing the costs associated with criminal trials.

Finally, judges serving on criminal courts should be the ones who introduce the charges to the jury, explaining in advance the penalty for the crime, as well as advising the jury on the different kinds of evidence they will be hearing. During the trial, a judge should act as both referee and team captain, making sure each side adheres to the rules of evidence while moving things along at a manageable pace. Once a verdict has been reached, a judge should then pronounce sentence immediately and the defendant should begin their rehabilitation or other punishment.

From this point on, appeals should be limited and based upon new factual evidence or the discovery of wrongdoing on the part of the prosecution. (Prosecutors and police investigators, as well as witnesses in a trial should face serious sanctions if it is later to be found that they knowingly fabricated evidence to convict an innocent person.) Semantic irregularities or procedural errors should not negate hard, solid evidence of guilt or free guilty criminals.

These initial changes to our criminal court system could improve the fairness and consistency of trials. The streamlined evidence process, intended to bring forth the facts and separate the subjective evidence would mean quicker trials and lower overall costs on all sides, something only the lawyers will be saddened by. And the use of pre-arranged sentencing guidelines and limited appeals would increase the likelihood that criminals would be made to answer for their digressions.

I have offered two pieces of the reformed criminal justice system: the restructuring of jurisdiction and establishment of a three-tiered enforcement and investigative hierarchy, and a streamlined criminal court program. Both elements eliminate waste and offer society more security by focusing on prosecuting criminal behavior. Next up…reforming our system of punishment.

Currently, the federal government has several enforcement and investigative agencies operating in the country. They range from the U.S. Marshal’s to the FBI to the Secret Service to the BATF. The list could go on, I’m sure, but I think you see what I mean. Clearly, the federal government has, and has had, the constitutional mandate to provide domestic security for the citizens of the nation. In fact, the Constitution provides, in several of its Articles, that Congress retain the ability to establish courts inferior to the Supreme Court (Article I, Section 8.9 & Article III, Section 1) and to create law and punishment for several specific crimes, including counterfeiting, piracy, and treason. (Article I, Section 8) The Constitution also provides that Congress shall guarantee every state in the Union, upon the application of the legislature, protection against domestic violence. (Article IV, Section 4) These first two provisions that I mention establish the foundation by which the federal government has the right and the duty to legislate and prosecute criminal acts. The last provision is the more important one though. It is this provision that could provide the states the opportunity to enact the changes I have proposed. Therefore, by virtue of the Constitution, if the various state legislatures were to vote to cede the power of enforcement and prosecution of the worst crimes to the federal government, the Constitution requires that the federal government assume those tasks.

Ceding this jurisdiction to a federal agency would result in a national criminal code. This code would establish uniformity across the various states with regards to the crimes under the federal jurisdiction. Prohibited behaviors would be unlawful in all fifty states, to the same degrees, and with the same punishments. Investigative techniques for these crimes would be consistent nation wide with access to the finest crime solving technology available. Prosecution for these crimes would be fairly applied and not dependent upon social status or education. This would require a more consistently trained and highly skilled group of workers, but would also result in more uniformity in the way these crimes were investigated and prosecuted. This uniformity would provide greater over-all security to all citizens by removing the barriers and incentives that currently allow serious criminals to avoid detection and prosecution simply by changing their location. The federal agency would also be responsible for conducting trials and for administering the punishment to those offenders who committed national crimes.

Once the states have transferred jurisdiction of the worst crimes to the Federal Criminal Justice Agency, the rest becomes a matter of reorganization. At the federal level, we would need to eliminate the current cadre of agencies and create a single entity responsible for enforcing, investigating, and prosecuting said crimes. The consolidation of forensic laboratories and the sharing of information would streamline the costs associated with enforcing and prosecuting the law. This would also reduce the margin of error in the collection and evaluation of evidence by applying a common standard of practice. Such activities would also have the added benefit of providing a consistent method by which crimes were investigated and tried and help reduce the instances of unjust prosecution or the allegations of unjust prosecutions. Consistent standards would thereby help assure that guilty offenders would be less likely to be released by a jury or judge based on technical problems, thus ensuring that they serve their sentence for their crime.

State agencies, once unburdened with the costs and manpower requirements of investigating major crimes, would be better able to prevent and prosecute those crimes of a lesser nature. Major crimes are usually more costly to investigate and prosecute, and due to the nature of the crimes themselves, those convicted often remain incarcerated for a longer period of time. These costs are growing more every year, making it difficult for states to find the resources to combat the more common, less serious crimes. Since it is often these “mid-level” crimes that are most rampant in society, allowing a state criminal justice agency to focus only on this level of crime would mean that better enforcement could be available. With greater financial resources available for law enforcement, prosecution, rehabilitation or incarceration, states would be better able to punish offenders as they should be punished, rather than giving a slap on the wrists. This would end the revolving door mentality of our correction system because the resources would be available to retrain or retain those offenders. In addition to these tasks, the state agencies would contribute to the federal agency’s information database for certain crimes as well as assist federal agents in detaining or locating suspects.

Our local governments would benefit the most from this restructuring, at least financially. The burden for enforcement, prosecution, and incarceration of criminals would be largely taken out of their domain. Local law enforcement would consist mainly of ensuring that local ordinances were being observed, but would also assist both state and federal agents as needed in detaining or locating suspects. The need for a large local force to protect the citizenry from heinous crime would disappear and the cities and counties could reallocate their budgets accordingly, allowing for more local tax dollars to be used for the community.

Getting back to the Constitution for a minute, Article 6 of the Bill of Rights provides that criminal prosecutions be afforded a speedy and public trial in the district where the crime was committed. This provision was included as a protection to the accused individual to prevent their being convicted by people whose social norms were vastly different or by judges and prosecutors hell bent of some kind of back room retaliation. It may seem that by changing the current system from one of jurisdiction by location to one of jurisdiction by act would run contrary to this concept. Where would federal criminals be prosecuted? What about state offenders? Would there be some centralized national or state crime courts? Applying some old-fashioned Common Sense easily solves this problem.

In order to satisfy the requirements of the Constitution and still remain fiscally prudent while at the same time restructuring our criminal justice system, each community would be home to a combined Criminal Justice Center. This building would house all three agencies, as well as their investigative laboratories and information databases. By combining these agencies into a central location, the use of tax dollars to maintain multiple facilities would be reduced, as would the associated support staff. These savings could be used to increase the number of investigators or upgrade the forensic technologies or better rehabilitate those who can be rehabilitated. The community becomes better protected in a fiscally responsible way and the offender is still provided their constitutional rights of being tried in the district where the offense occurred.

My case for reforming the criminal justice system is based on the notion that some crimes are equally anti-social regardless of location and should thus be categorized as national offenses in order to ensure equal protection for all citizens. It is also based on the idea that our current criminal system is too expensive because of the multitude of similar agencies doing similar jobs while maintaining their independence from each other. This restructuring is only the first step in creating a system that truly works to protect all citizens equally. My next essay will discuss reforms for the prosecution and punishment phase of our criminal system. We can change the way we fight crime, but we also have to change the way we punish or rehabilitate the offender.

In order for a society to function properly, mutually agreed upon rules of conduct, or laws, are established by a consensus of the people through their elected officials. These laws are meant to serve as a guideline for acceptable public behavior as well as establishing penalties for those who break the laws. As citizens, we are bound to observe the laws of the land to the best of our ability. But it is also necessary, and perhaps more important even, to ensure that any law on the books is both necessary and enforceable. It is our task, as involved participants in society, to insist that the laws are applied fairly and that punishments meted out are both appropriate and consistently applied. Also, as stewards of the public purse, we must demand from our elected representatives that the creation, application, and administration of laws and penalties be accomplished in the most economically sound manner possible.

Our current jigsaw puzzle of legal codes, enforcement agencies, prosecutorial districts, and correctional practices is confusing, expensive, and duplicitous. Worse yet, the effectiveness is highly questionable. We are sending more people into our prison system each year, yet crime continues to flourish. We have enacted so many civil codes that many people have no idea whether questionable behavior is in fact illegal behavior or just boorish. Our court systems are overworked, mostly due to unlimited appeals processes, questionably written legal codes, allowable yet unfathomable prosecutorial and defense tactics and spurious civil cases. Our punishment system is rife with individuals serving different sentences for the same crimes, while others are not even prosecuted. We need to rethink our system and reform it so that it better serves the citizens who uphold it.

Because of the many elements involved in reforming our system of justice, I will be breaking this discussion into several essays. In these essays I will discuss Common Sense reforms for the criminal legal system, the civil legal system, the punishment process, and national security issues as they pertain to the physical boundaries of the United States. Such changes will attempt to produce a justice and security system that is more consistently applied, more fiscally responsible, less intrusive in everyday life, and yet still adheres to the protections afforded American citizens by our Constitution. We can then find people who support these reforms and elect them into public office so that the nonsense that passes for leadership and rational legislation can become a thing of the past.

I will begin then, with reform in our criminal legal system. The first concept I’d like to talk about is that of jurisdictional restructuring. What I mean by this is that rather than have duplicated laws for the same crimes in each of our counties and states, we should develop a national criminal code based upon the crimes themselves. This would require the implementation of a three-tiered system of responsibility: crimes handled by a Federal Justice agency, crimes handled by a State Justice Agency, and crimes handled by a Local Justice agency. I know that we have this kind of stratification in place already, but the current system has agencies fighting over resources and boundaries while leaving the public confused and under-protected.

In this new system, the Federal agency would have jurisdiction over all major violent crimes against individuals, crimes against our country that occur within our borders, crimes that involve the misuse or abuse of the public trust, and immigration crimes. The laws and punishments for these acts would be universal in nature, bringing about an end to the disparities that currently exist among the states. Crimes such as murder, rape, kidnapping, armed robbery, counterfeiting, treason, bribery of public servants, massive fraud, willful environmental destruction and immigration would all fall under the Federal agency’s jurisdiction.

The State agencies would be responsible for most crimes against private and public property, less serious physical crimes against people, fraudulent actions, criminal business codes, and traffic enforcement. These laws would probably be similar from state to state, but could account for differences in regional values and geographical concerns. The citizens of the state, through their state legislatures, would decide the punishments. The State agencies would not be responsible for enforcing or prosecuting those crimes assigned to the Federal agency, but would be available to share information regarding criminal behavior and could assist as needed in an investigatory role.

Our Local agencies would likely be the least burdened of the three, and rightly so. Local enforcement costs are driving many communities to cut their police forces or slash spending in other programs for their citizens. This does not give our cities a leaner, more effective security system, but instead makes us less secure as our populations grow in relation to our dwindling police forces. Local agencies would be charged with handling mostly misdemeanor offenses coinciding with local ordinances, rather than with the major crimes.

In my next essay, I will talk a little about the structure of each of these agencies, how they would work in concert with each other and with society to produce a safer environment for all of us to live in. I will talk about the provisions placed in our national Constitution and how they relate to this new division of duties. Society has the right to expect to be able to live our lives without fear of crime and without the fear of unjust government prosecution. We have the right to expect that criminal behavior is either rehabilitated or the offender removed from the general population. We have the duty to create only good laws, laws based not on various moral opinions or special interests, but on collectively agreed upon premises. And we have the responsibility to make sure that the administration of our criminal legal system does not overburden our public finances by being duplicitous, confusing, and arbitrary.