# Land of the Free? So why do you lock up so many of your citizens? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [August 28, 2002, 4:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/land-of-the-free-so-why-do-you-lock-up-so-many-of-your-citizens/125903 "2002-08-28T04:51:06Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 3\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![sailor](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a587f6/32.png) [@sailor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sailor)\ **Post date:** [September 2, 2002, 7:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/land-of-the-free-so-why-do-you-lock-up-so-many-of-your-citizens/125903/61 "2002-09-02T07:06:15Z")
While forfeiture laws have been upheld, IMHO, they infringe on the “no punishment without due process” clause and should all be repealed. ---
**Author:** ![december](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/838e76/32.png) [@december](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/december)\ **Post date:** [September 2, 2002, 4:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/land-of-the-free-so-why-do-you-lock-up-so-many-of-your-citizens/125903/62 "2002-09-02T16:07:03Z")
This [column](http://www.techcentralstation.com/1051/techwrapper.jsp?PID=1051-250&CID=1051-090202B) takes a different POV about the war on drugs. Unfortunately, there are no links. > [@](#): > > There were 469,000 African American males between the ages of 18 and 24 who were enrolled in college in 2000, compared to 180,000 in prison or jail. An African American male of college age is therefore over two and a half times as likely to be in college than in prison. That is a significant difference… > > There are 747,000 African American women aged 18-24 enrolled in college, but only 9,000 in prison or jail. Less than a decade ago, in 1994, there were only 561,000 African American women enrolled in college. That represents a 33 percent increase in only 6 years… > > \*\*It seems likely, as the New York Times was careful to point out in its coverage of the story, that the relative increase in incarceration spending by the States in the '80s and '90s was fueled not by a desire to invest more in the war on drugs by locking up young black males than in their education, but by an actual increase in violent crime. \*\*Thankfully, that phase seems to be over. We should be happy that today’s young African Americans of both sexes are far more likely to be listening to an economics lecturer than to the barked orders of a corrections officer. The highlighted sentence says there was a real increase in violent crime, and that the NY Times supports that POV. I wish I had actual quotes from the Times on this issue… ---
**Author:** ![AZCowboy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/97f17d/32.png) [@AZCowboy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AZCowboy)\ **Post date:** [September 2, 2002, 5:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/land-of-the-free-so-why-do-you-lock-up-so-many-of-your-citizens/125903/63 "2002-09-02T17:21:08Z")
> [@](#): > > _ **samclems said:** _ > If there was a Supreme Court decision that allowed the forfeiture of cars of patrons of prostitutes, it would be pretty common knowledge around the US. The local police departments would be awash in autos. They aren’t. There isn’t. Don’t waste you time. OK, **samclems** , I dug up the reference. In **[Bennis v. Michigan, 1996](http://caselaw.lp.findlaw.com/scripts/getcase.pl?navby=search&court=US&case=/us/000/u10205.html)**, SCOTUS upheld a Michigan forfeiture case where the wife was a joint owner of the car that the husband used to solicit a prostitute. The wife had no knowledge of the husband’s activities, but that didn’t matter. It is a bit of a dry read, but absolutely fascinating if you are interested in this area of law. And I agree with **sailor** , I find such a ruling to be an abomination. Akron is not that far from Detroit, is it? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/land-of-the-free-so-why-do-you-lock-up-so-many-of-your-citizens/125903.md?page=3)