Charles B. Rangel Quotes

Now, I - for several years while I was researching this book, I felt quite obsessed by thoughts about sentencing, punishment, how judges arrive at their decisions.

I strongly believe that for serious and violent criminals, we must absolutely hold them accountable for their crimes and send them to prison.

Every first year law student learns that sentencing has four goals: retribution, incapicitation, deterrence, and rehabilitation.

Every day, lax sentencing costs lives.

Even without mandatory sentences, judges are still capable of levying tough penalties for serious offenses - and just as in states like Texas that have 'tough on crime' reputations, this can be done without jeopardizing public safety.

First of all, I didn't suggest that we should simply get rid of all prisons.

America's criminal justice system isn't known for rehabilitation. I'm not sure that, as a society, we are even interested in that concept anymore.

All emphasis in American prisons is on punishment, retribution, and disparagement, and almost none is on rehabilitation.

Obviously, people who commit crimes should be punished. Even people who steal socks and 'Snow White' videos should probably do time if they have priors, especially serious priors. But the punishment has to fit the crime, and the standard has to be the same for everyone.

We have determined as a society, as a country, as a people, that the incarceration and the supervision and the specific fines for a particular crime are that person's debt to society.

Generally speaking, the public appetite for criminal justice policy is just tough talk.

Any politician who wants to eliminate parole just doesn’t understand law enforcement.

I'm very tough on crimes where there are victims who have been physically harmed. In such cases, I do not believe in leniency.

What has too often happened in the past is that people have threatened punishment but have failed to carry it out. It's imperative in any initiative that is undertaken that punishment be real and that there be truth in sentencing, and that the truly dangerous offenders - the recidivists and the career criminals - be put away and kept away.

The question is, does the punishment fit the crime? So we're not saying that we shouldn't punish people. We're not talking about a society that tolerates lawlessness. We should be very tough on people who are perpetuating violent crimes, for example. But we should make sure that it's tailored and not arbitrary.

No one would normally accuse me of being soft on crime.

A proper criminal justice system exacts justice - that is, punishes criminals for their crimes. Rehabilitation and deterrence are worthy goals, but they are secondary to retribution.

None of my peers avoided prison. None of 'em.

Our justice system is a punitive one that's there to sort of deal with what happens after someone's already offended.

I have prosecuted very serious criminals who are now serving very long jail sentences.

The act of policing is, in order to punish less often, to punish more severely.

Punishment can do a lot for criminals, and send a message to the rest of society.

Let the punishments of criminals be useful. A hanged man is good for nothing; a man condemned to public works still serves the country, and is a living lesson.

Well I certainly have learned and I hope I'm moving on and certainly two years of prison was a terrible punishment.

You can make a very good argument that society would be much worse off if you let 10 rapists and murderers free rather than put one poor, wrongly accused accountant in prison. And so my only point on that is that it should open up an argument. It should not sort of settle one, because nobody disagrees with it.