Punishment Does not Have to Equal Imprisonment

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Recommended: Studies on prison systems

America has one of the highest incarceration rates when compared to other developed countries. Before we place the cuffs on, let us check again, as to why they are placed. Criminals as we call them are the people who have been found guilty of a crime beyond reasonable doubt. They have committed crimes that the general public has found requiring punishment or some sort of rehabilitation. Therefore, we send them off to penitentiaries so they can have a “time-out” until they have served sufficient time equal to the crime they have committed. They are us, just another American who has unfortunately disobeyed the law that binds us to live civilized with one another. That being said, we must keep them in mind when we place the convicted into prisons and determine how to spend our resources to supply those prisons.

Laws: Now let us dive into laws. There are two classifications of law in the United States that we are voluntarily accepted, the first are civil laws our responsibilities to others. Civil offences are usually violations of contracts, like marriage, landlord/tenant disputes, or property disputes. The second category of law that we hold are criminal laws; these are “rules of conduct that have been codified and carry with them standardized consequences for their violation” (Del Castillo, 2012). Criminal laws are split in two sections and will be covered over this paragraph. Malum in se are criminal offences that hold the behavior that have been deemed “naturally evil as adjudged by the sense of civilized community” (Del Castillo, 2012). These include homicide, rape, robbery, and assault. Malum in se require of a violent mental state because they are considered destructive in nature. Malum Prohibitum are “Public Welfare Offen...

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...e, it widely used and accepted so much so that the U.S. Constitution was written on cannabis paper.

Works Cited

Henrichson, C., & Delaney, R. (2012). The price of prisons: What incarceration costs taxpayers. Federal Sentencing Reporter, 25(1), 68-80. doi:http://dx.doi.org/10.1525/fsr.2012.25.1.68

Trout, G. (2011). THE COST OF INCARCERATION: OHIO PRISONS. University Of Toledo Law Review, 42(4), 891-901.

Katel, P. (2007, April 6). Prison reform. CQ Researcher, 17, 289-312. Retrieved from http://library.cqpress.com/cqresearcher/

Conyers Jr., J. (2013). The Incarceration Explosion. Yale Law & Policy Review, 31(2), 377-387.

STELLOH, T. (2013). California's Great Prison Experiment. Nation, 296(26/27), 31-34.

Wallace, G. (2012). THE REAL LETHAL PUNISHMENT: THE INADEQUACY OF PRISON HEALTH CARE AND HOW IT CAN BE FIXED. Faulkner Law Review, 4(1), 265-297.

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