Organization: Computer Science Department,  Stanford University.
Newsgroups: bit.listserv.politics
Date:         Mon, 28 Dec 1992 14:57:45 -0800
From:         Andy Freeman <andy@SAIL.STANFORD.EDU>
Subject: Re: intent and punishment

>>Suppose our goal is to reduce the occurrence of harmful acts.  That
>>provides a basis for distinguishing first time "I tried to do that"
>>and "oops, I didn't mean to do it"; that basis is that it's probably
>>easier to adjust the behavior of the latter person than that of the
>>former.  (After someone has said "oops" a number of times, we
>>obviously need more effective measures such as those we use for "I
>>tried to do it".)  If it turns out that it's actually easier to change
>>the behavior of "I wanted to kill her" than "oops", then the "oops"
>>people get the serious hosing (to the extent that serious hosing
>>works).

>His claim seems to be this. We should assess LIGHTER penalties
>against those who are "easier to convince." That's a bit
>unclear to me.

No.  My claim is that if we're punishing to reduce the incidence, our
punishment strategy should reflect that.  If we have other goals, our
strategy should reflect them.  I'm trying to find out what goal the
"hate crimes deserve more severe sentences than other intentional
acts" folks have.

I showed that "prevent harm" required some additional evidence.  I
proposed another, namely "nazis are bad", and suggested that it wasn't
a good particularly good reason.  It seems reasonable to expect the
proponents of hate-crime laws to know the good reasons so I'm asking.

>Suppose the HARDEST people to convince are
>those who commit violent crimes in the heat of the moment.
>Such people just don't calculate the costs in advance.

Why should we worry about crimes committed by purple cows?

>It doesn't make much sense to threaten such people with
>stiffer penalties. Stiffer penalties won't deter them.

Okay, so we'll let said purple cows walk.  Was I supposed to object to
this?

>But we do not punish criminally negligent homicide more severely
>than unpremeditated murder, even though the former is likely
>to involve more calculation, and be more "deterrable" than the
>latter.

I like the assumption that degree of calculation implies something
about deterability.  (Criminally negligent homicide does not imply
"calculation aimed at death", it implies calculation aimed at
something ELSE with a marked disregard for whether or not death
occurs.)  How about some data?

>In any case, it may well be the case that racially motivated
>crimes are deterrable by more severe threats. As Andy says,
>we need more evidence. But on the face of it, gathering
>evidence and deciding which kinds of deterrence works is
>a job for state legislatures, not for the Supreme Court.

And, who decides whether or not said legislators bothered to
gather said evidence and make such a determination?

While I haven't seen anything that indicates that said legislators did
bother, everything I've seen indicates that they're acting on the
"nazis are evil so let's hose them when they step out of line" theory,
maybe they did.  Does anyone have the relevant evidence?

>(This is sort of ironic, I think. During the most recent
>on-list discussion of capital punishment, *I* was more or
>less insisting on a deterrence justification for punishments,
>and Andy was suggesting a different account.)

My impression was that Jamie was arguing that nothing short of clear
and convincing evidence for a deterrence effect of capital punishment
was adequate justification for capital punishment.  While I probably
pointed out that we don't have that standard for any other punishment,
which is relevant because most people "killed" by the criminal justice
system aren't explicitly sentenced to die and we certainly meet the
"should know that deaths will occur" standard, I tried to emphasize
that there are other defensible goals and defended them.

Now I'm asking the proponents of "hate crime" laws to come up to that
same standard.

-andy can do it, so it isn't too much to expect from "good people"
--
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