A national survey conducted by the Washington Post, Harvard University, and the Kaiser Family Foundation recently concluded what most Americans already knew... "people have lost trust in each other" (See Washington Post 01/28/96).
The first responsibility of government is to protect its citizens from harm. When the government abdicates this responsibility and fails to lock up murderers and violent felons, citizens are left fending for themselves. Security devices proliferate, guns proliferate, and distrust in people and in human nature proliferates.
When the government lets violent criminals loose on the streets, it devalues society's trust in human nature. In New York City alone, there are over 13,000 murderers out on parole on any given day. In such a climate, it is irrational to trust a stranger.
Mainstreaming violent felons into society is a recipe for disaster. Trust, after all, is the glue that holds society together. Without trust, people resort to basic survival tactics. They make sweeping generalizations about people and places. Whole areas of cities become off-limits. Entire racial groups become subject to suspicion. Racial discrimination and racial divisions thus increase with a breakdown of the criminal justice system.
In the past, people had confidence that most of the people they encounter on the street were basically honest. After all, most of the dishonest or violent people were behind bars. With today's lenient sentencing and liberal parole, citizens can no longer feel this assurance. The result is distrust and discrimination.
-cfa 03/07/96
