Jean Valjean: Victim of Mandatory Minimum Sentencing

On Sunday, the country’s most talented actors in musical theater will celebrate the best of the best at the Seventieth Annual Tony Awards. While most of the attention will be focused on Lin-Manuel Miranda’s musical about the United States’ most statist founder, now is a more appropriate time than ever to reflect upon the lessons of a better, far more libertarian play: Les Misérables.

The play, based on the novel by French author Victor Hugo, is a tale of redemption. Protagonist Jean Valjean begins the story in chains, finishing a nineteen year sentence for committing petty theft. Valjean stole a loaf of bread from a local market to save his sister’s son from starvation, and the criminal justice system of post-Napoleonic France did not hesitate to throw the book at him by condemning him to a life of parole.

Instead of complying with the egregiously harsh sentence, Valjean decides to start a new life under an alias thanks to the incredible generosity of a Bishop. Even after the convict attempted to steal the Bishop’s silver from the church, upon being returned by the police, the Bishop claims the valuables were a gift to Valjean and sends him off to start his life over.

Throughout the musical, Valjean is chased by the persistent Inspector Javert: an agent of the law with an intense commitment to law and order. He chases Valjean for seventeen years, never questioning that he is in the right, and his prey — a convicted criminal — is morally wrong. After having his life spared by the protagonist during the June Rebellion, the inspector begins to question the legitimacy his entire life’s mission before ultimately committing suicide.

While the story makes for phenomenal entertainment, the plot would not have transpired if France had implemented a just criminal justice system. Jean Valjean’s only crime — simple petty theft — earned him nineteen years in prison and a lifetime of parole. In most states in the U.S. today, petty theft (or larceny) includes a fine of no more than $1,000 and a sentence of imprisonment of no more than twelve months.

It is easy to look down upon the punitive structure of nineteenth century France with a condescending “it can’t happen here” attitude; but the United States throws individuals in jail for far longer sentences for crimes without a victim. These unjust outcomes are a result of federal mandatory minimum sentencing laws.

Mandatory minimums are statues that limit judicial discretion wherein people convicted of certain crimes must be punished with at least a minimum number of years in prison. In the U.S., most victims of the system are those convicted of drug crimes. In those cases,  prosecutors have great power to influence a defendant’s sentence and thereby create incentives to accept a plea agreement. In particular, defendants with prior drug felonies are often subject to harsh mandatory minimums.

According to Families Against Mandatory Minimums (FAMM), “These inflexible, ‘one-size-fits-all’ sentencing laws may seem like a quick-fix solution for crime, but they undermine justice by preventing judges from fitting the punishment to the individual and the circumstances of their offenses.” FAMM’s assertions are backed up by sound evidence, and there is a growing consensus that the laws have caused America’s incarceration rate to reach number one in the world.

Much like the oppressive regimes in Hugo’s France, America’s “War on Drugs” has been used as a tool to oppress the socially downtrodden. No book better explores this than Michelle Alexander’s The New Jim Crow. Alexander points out that blacks and whites are equally likely to commit drug crimes, yet blacks are convicted at a much higher rate.

“In the era of colorblindness, it is no longer socially permissible to use race, explicitly, as a justification for discrimination, exclusion, and social contempt. So we don’t,” she wrote. “Rather than rely on race, we use our criminal justice system to label people of color criminals and then engage in all the practices we supposedly left behind.”

U.S. Senator Rand Paul, who introduced a federal mandatory minimum sentencing reform bill in 2013, frequently cites the stories of minority drug war victims serving draconian terms as a result of antiquated policies. Josh Horner, a black American, is currently serving twenty-five years for selling his own pain pills, and Weldon Angelos, who was originally sentenced to fifty-five years for small-time marijuana and gun charges but was freed after thirteen years (only at the behest of a benevolent prosecutor), are among the many victims denied a shot at redemption by the system.

So on the eve of the Tony Awards, take a moment to think about those irreparably harmed by mandatory minimums. Think about how there are thousands of Jean Valjeans out there wanting nothing more than a second chance that the system perpetually denies them. Think about how it is immoral for these perpetrators of victimless crimes to even spend “One Day More” in prison. It is time to stop leaving many friends and families with nothing but “Empty Chairs and Empty Tables” where their loved ones once sat.  Let us bring an end to this nonsense.

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Read More Here October 18, 2023 at 2:50 am

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