How Conservatism Increases Crime

Mr. Trump claims that his administration is sending federal officers to cities “run by Liberal Democrats” in order “to quell violence.” The targeted cities and states have not asked for federal assistance and have strongly objected over such invasions calling them unconstitutional.

This is a familiar dog whistle to the right. Mr. Nixon once reignited his political career with a promise to “get tough on crime.” The implication is that crime will run amok under Liberal leadership, while conservatives will “get tough” and in order to combat violence.

In reality, the opposite is true. Conservatism inflames and expands crime. The “war on drugs,” which Mr. Nixon started, has increased crime, just as the Prohibition of alcohol did decades earlier. Criminalization of the drug trade led to the rise of dangerous gangs and cartels. Conservative gun laws ensure a steady flow of powerful weapons into the hands of gang members and drug dealers. In order to deal with these heavily armed enemies, police forces had to militarize, a policy that has caused significant collateral damage in minority communities. Conservative sentencing mandates treat non-violent drug offenders as felons. Long prison sentences for minor crimes put tremendous strain on families that were already fighting an uphill battle against a wide array of inequitable public policies.

Are you skeptical? You don’t have to take my word for it. John Ehrlichman, White House Counsel and Chief Domestic Advisor in the Nixon Administration summarized the intention of his boss’s “law and order” policies.

>>“You want to know what this was really all about?” he asked with the bluntness of a man who, after public disgrace and a stretch in federal prison, had little left to protect. “The Nixon campaign in 1968, and the Nixon White House after that, had two enemies: the antiwar left and black people. You understand what I’m saying? We knew we couldn’t make it illegal to be either against the war or black, but by getting the public to associate the hippies with marijuana and blacks with heroin, and then criminalizing both heavily, we could disrupt those communities. We could arrest their leaders, raid their homes, break up their meetings, and vilify them night after night on the evening news. Did we know we were lying about the drugs? Of course we did.”<<