Osler's Razor

Here in Minneapolis, I'm starting to see some parallels between Dallas/Fort Worth and this area. Great restaurants. Great newspapers, too- I really like the Dallas Morning News. Their editorial staff has been great to work with in the pieces I have had there, and they do a wonderful job of editing my work-- it always gets better. In the past, I have had the chance on their editorial pages to discuss the death penalty, religion and the Supreme Court, and crack sentencing.

Yesterday, they ran a piece on what I am currently focusing on: The Presidential pardon power, and this President's unwillingness to use it. You can see that article here, and it got a nice bump from pardon guru P.S. Ruckman over at the Pardon Power blog, and from the Friends of Justice folks. If you read the whole thing, you might notice that I'm being a little more aggressive on this one-- here and elsewhere, I am pushing for some action on commutations before the end of the year.

Here is part of what I had to say:

Some have described the reverence Americans have for the Constitution as a "civil religion," and I'm not sure that is a bad thing. Religions instill values, and the Constitution certainly does that – it promotes and describes the values of self-restraint, of consensus, and of individual liberty. That is not a bad batch of virtues. In the pardon power, though, the Constitution expects expression of an additional virtue: mercy.

Mercy to those unfairly treated is an idea deeply engrained in the American consciousness and spirit, like the concepts of liberty and restraint. The framers did not lightly place the unchecked power of the pardon in the president's hands, because that power can easily be abused (as it sometimes has been). Still, they granted the executive that power with the expectation that from time to time rough edges in criminal law sometimes would have to be shaved off.