Latest / Gil I Am / Why High Crime Rate in Democrat-Run Cities Thomas Sowell

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Why High Crime Rate in Democrat-Run Cities Thomas Sowell · Gil I Am

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  Speaker 1: Let us examine one of the most pressing issues facing
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  Speaker 1: our nation, the persistent high crime rates in cities governed
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  Speaker 1: by democratic leadership. This is not a matter of partisan politics,
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  Speaker 1: but rather an empirical examination of policies and their consequences.
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  Speaker 1: When we look at the data objectively, patterns emerge that
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  Speaker 1: demand serious consideration. Let me begin with a fundamental question
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  Speaker 1: that should guide our discussion. Why do cities like Chicago, Baltimore, Detroit,
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  Speaker 1: Saint Louis, and Philadelphia consistently rank among the most dangerous
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  Speaker 1: in America. These cities share certain characteristics beyond their crime statistics.
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  Speaker 1: They have been governed by democratic mayors and city councils
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  Speaker 1: for decades, sometimes stretching back fifty years or more without interruption.
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  Speaker 1: This is not coincidence, and it deserves explanation rather than dismissal.
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  Speaker 1: The intellectual foundation for understanding crime has been corrupted by
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  Speaker 1: what I call the vision of the anointed, the belief
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  Speaker 1: among progressive elits that they possess superior wisdom and moral
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  Speaker 1: authority to reshape society according to their theories. This vision
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  Speaker 1: has dominated urban policy making for generations. Yet, rather than
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  Speaker 1: acknowledged failure, proponents of these policies continue to double down,
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  Speaker 1: always finding new excuses for why their approach hasn't worked.
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  Speaker 1: Consider the theoretical framework that guides democratic urban policy. Crime,
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  Speaker 1: according to this worldview, is primarily a product of social
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  Speaker 1: conditions poverty, inequality, lack of opportunity, and systemic racism. The
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  Speaker 1: criminal is viewed as a victim of circumstances beyond his control.
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  Speaker 1: This perspective naturally leads to policies that emphasize social programs
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  Speaker 1: over law enforcement, rehabilitation over punishment, and root causes over
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  Speaker 1: immediate public safety concerns. This approach sounds compassionate and enlightened.
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  Speaker 1: Who could argue against addressing power and inequality. The problem
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  Speaker 1: lies not in these worthy goals, but in the assumption
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  Speaker 1: that crime rates will automatically decline as social conditions improve.
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  Speaker 1: This assumption has been tested for more than half a
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  Speaker 1: century in American cities, and the results speak for themselves.
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  Speaker 1: Let us examine the historical record with the dispassion that
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  Speaker 1: empirical analysis demands. In nineteen sixty, before the great Liberal
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  Speaker 1: experiment in criminal justice reform began, murder rates and major
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  Speaker 1: American cities were substantially lower than they are today. This
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  Speaker 1: was true, despite the fact that poverty rates will higher,
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  Speaker 1: Social programs were less extensive, and what progressives call systemic
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  Speaker 1: racism was far more prevalent and legally sanctioned than it
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  Speaker 1: is now. The transformation began in earnest during the one
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  Speaker 1: nine hundred and sixty incidents, when a new generation of
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  Speaker 1: liberal politicians, judges, and intellectuals gained influence over criminal justice policy.
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  Speaker 1: They implemented reform based on the theory that crime could
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  Speaker 1: be reduced by addressing its supposed root causes, while simultaneously
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  Speaker 1: making the criminal justice system more lenient and humane. The
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  Speaker 1: results were catastrophic. Between nineteen sixty and nineteen eighty, as
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  Speaker 1: these policies took hold, murder rates doubled in many cities,
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  Speaker 1: violent crime rates tripled. Entire neighborhoods that had been safe
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  Speaker 1: for generations became war zones. The victims were disproportionately the
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  Speaker 1: very people These policies were supposedly designed to help poor
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  Speaker 1: and minority residents of inner cities who could not afford
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  Speaker 1: to move to safer areas. Yet, rather than acknowledge this failure,
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  Speaker 1: proponents of liberal crime policy have consistently moved the goal
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  Speaker 1: posts when crime rates soared in the one thousand, nine
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  Speaker 1: hundred and sixty s and one thousand, nine hundred and
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  Speaker 1: seventy s, they blamed it on the Vietnam War, social upheaval,
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  Speaker 1: or the legacy of racism. When crime rates began declining
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  Speaker 1: in the one thousand, nine hundred and ninety following tougher
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  Speaker 1: law enforcement policies, they attributed the improvement to economic growth,
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  Speaker 1: demographic changes, or This pattern of intellectual dishonesty has profound
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  Speaker 1: consequences for policy making. When you refuse to acknowledge that
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  Speaker 1: your policies have failed, you cannot learn from your mistakes.
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  Speaker 1: When you attribute every positive outcome to factors other than
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  Speaker 1: policy changes, you have no basis for making rational policy decisions.
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  Speaker 1: This is why democratic run cities continue to pursue the
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  Speaker 1: same failed approaches decade after decade. Let me be specific
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  Speaker 1: about the policies I'm discussing. Democratic urban leaders consistently support
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  Speaker 1: reduced sentences for criminals, especially non violent drug offenders. They
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  Speaker 1: promote alternatives to incarcerations, such as drug courts, community service,
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  Speaker 1: and electronic monitoring. They resist three strikes laws and mandatory
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  Speaker 1: minimum sentences. They advocate for early release programs that oppose
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  Speaker 1: the construction of new prisons, a defund police departments while
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  Speaker 1: increasing spending on social programs. Each of these policies taken
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  Speaker 1: individually might seem reasonable to someone who've used crime primarily
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  Speaker 1: as a social problem, but taken together and implemented consistently
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  Speaker 1: over decades, they create a system that effectively signals to
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  Speaker 1: potential criminals that the consequences of criminal behavior are minimal
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  Speaker 1: and uncertain. This is particularly true for repeat offenders, who
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  Speaker 1: quickly learned to gain the system. The contrast with cities
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  Speaker 1: that have taken different approaches is instructive. New York City
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  Speaker 1: under mayors Rudolph Giuliani and Michael Bloomberg implemented aggressive policing
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  Speaker 1: strategies that targeted quality of life crimes and used data
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  Speaker 1: driven approaches to deploy police resources. The result was a
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  Speaker 1: dramatic reduction in crime rates that lasted for more than
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  Speaker 1: two decades. When Bill de Blasio became mayor and began
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  Speaker 1: reversing these policies, crime rates are declining again. This pattern
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  Speaker 1: is not unique to New York. Cities that have implemented
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  Speaker 1: tougher law enforcement policies have generally seen crime rates decline,
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  Speaker 1: while cities that have maintained or expanded liberal criminal justice
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  Speaker 1: policies have continued to struggle with high crime rates. The
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  Speaker 1: data is clear for those willing to examine it objectively,
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  Speaker 1: but data alone does not explain why democratic politicians continue
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  Speaker 1: to pursue failed policies. The answer lies in the incentive
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  Speaker 1: structures that govern urban politics. Democratic politicians and high crime
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  Speaker 1: cities depend heavily on two constituencies that benefit from the
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  Speaker 1: current system, the criminal justice bureaucracy that administers liberal policies
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  Speaker 1: as an attack on their world. The criminal justice bureaucracy
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  Speaker 1: includes not just public defenders and social workers, but also
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  Speaker 1: the vast network of nonprofit organizations that receive government funding
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  Speaker 1: to provide services to criminals and their families. Organizations have
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  Speaker 1: a vested interest in maintaining high crime rates because their
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  Speaker 1: funding and jobs depend on having a steady supply of
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  Speaker 1: clients to serve. They have no incentive to support policies
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  Speaker 1: that might actually reduce crime, because doing so would eliminate
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  Speaker 1: their reason for existence. The ideological activists, meanwhile, have invested
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  Speaker 1: so much of their identity in the belief that criminals
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  Speaker 1: are victims of society that they cannot acknowledge evidence to
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  Speaker 1: the contrary without undermining their entire worldview. For them, admitting
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  Speaker 1: that tougher law enforcement might reduce crime is tantamount to
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  Speaker 1: admitting that they have been wrong about fundamental questions of
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  Speaker 1: justice and morality. These constituencies are politically powerful in democratic
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  Speaker 1: cities because they are organized, motivated, and provide both votes
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  Speaker 1: and volunteer labor for democratic candidates. The victims of crime,
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  Speaker 1: by contrast, are often poorly organized and politically powerless. Many
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  Speaker 1: are afraid to speak out because they fear retaliation from
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  Speaker 1: criminals in their nestsighborhoods. Others have simply given up hope
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  Speaker 1: that the political system will respond to their concerns. This
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  Speaker 1: creates a perverse dynamic where democratic politicians are rewarded for
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  Speaker 1: pursuing policies that increase crime rather than reduce it. They
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  Speaker 1: can always blame crime on factors beyond their control poverty, racism,
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  Speaker 1: federal policy, or Republican governors, while taking credit for any
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  Speaker 1: temporary improvements that occur for other reasons. The media plays
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  Speaker 1: a crucial role in maintaining this system by consistently presenting
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  Speaker 1: liberal crime policies in a favorable light while downplaying their
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  Speaker 1: failures when crime rates rise. In democratic cities, the coverage
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  Speaker 1: focuses on the need for more social programs and gun control.
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  Speaker 1: When crime rates fall, the credit goes to everything except
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  Speaker 1: tougher law enforcement. This bias coverage makes it difficult for
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  Speaker 1: voters to make informed decisions about the effectiveness of different
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  Speaker 1: approaches to crime control. Academic criminal just bear a particularly
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  Speaker 1: responsibility for this state of affairs. Rather than conducting objective
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  Speaker 1: research on what works and what does it, many have
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  Speaker 1: become advocates for liberal policies. They produce studies that support
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  Speaker 1: their preferred outcomes while ignoring or dismissing evidence that contradicts
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  Speaker 1: their theories. This academic malpractice has profound consequences for public
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  Speaker 1: policy because politicians rely on academic research to justify their decisions.
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  Speaker 1: The human cost of these failed policies cannot be measured
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  Speaker 1: in statistics alone. Every murder, rape, robbery, and assault that
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  Speaker 1: could have been prevented by effective law enforcement represents a
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  Speaker 1: life destroyed or permanently damaged. The victims are not abstractions
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  Speaker 1: in academic journals. They are real people with families, dreams,
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  Speaker 1: and contributions to make the society consider the psychological impact
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  Speaker 1: on children growing up in high crime neighborhoods where liberal
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  Speaker 1: policies have failed. These children learn early that violence is
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  Speaker 1: a normal part of life, that the police cannot or
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  Speaker 1: will not protect them, and that criminals face few meaningful
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  Speaker 1: consequences for their actions. They internalize these lessons and often
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  Speaker 1: conclude that they must either become predators themselves or resign
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  Speaker 1: themselves to being victims. The economic consequences are equally devastating.
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  Speaker 1: Businesses flee high crime areas, taking jobs and investment with them.
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  Speaker 1: Property values plummet, destroying the wealth of families who cannot
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  Speaker 1: afford to move. Tourism and commerce decline, reducing tax revenues
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  Speaker 1: they could fund better schools and infrastructure. The result is
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  Speaker 1: a downward spiral that traps generations in poverty and dysfunction.
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  Speaker 1: Yet democratic politicians consistently ignore these realities in favor of
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  Speaker 1: policies that make them feel virtuous while accomplishing nothing positive.
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  Speaker 1: They pass gun control laws that disarmed law abiding citizens
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  Speaker 1: while doing nothing to prevent criminals from obtaining weapons. They
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  Speaker 1: increase spending on social programs that have no measurable impact
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  Speaker 1: on crime rates. They blame police officers for the consequences
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  Speaker 1: of their own failed policy. The gun control obsession is
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  Speaker 1: particularly revealing of the intellectual bankruptcy of liberal crime policy.
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  Speaker 1: Democratic politicians and high crime cities consistently blame their problems
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  Speaker 1: on loose gun laws in other states or the proliferation
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  Speaker 1: of guns generally, but this explanation falls apart under scrutiny.
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  Speaker 1: Cities like Chicago have some of the strictest gun laws
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  Speaker 1: in the nation, yet they also have some of the
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  Speaker 1: highest murder rates. Meanwhile, states with permissive gun laws often
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  Speaker 1: have lower crime rates than cities with strict gun control.
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  Speaker 1: The focus on gun control also reveals the extent to
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  Speaker 1: which democratic politicians prefer symbolic gestures to substantute policy changes.
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  Speaker 1: Passing gun control laws allows them to claim they are
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  Speaker 1: doing something about crime without actually confronting the hard choices
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  Speaker 1: involved in effective law enforcement. It shifts attention away from
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  Speaker 1: their policy failures while providing a convenient scapegoat for continuing problems.
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  Speaker 1: Prison policy provides another example of how ideology trumps evidence
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  Speaker 1: in democratic crime policy. Despite overwhelming evidence that incarceration reduces
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  Speaker 1: crime by incapacitating repeat offenders, democratic politicians consistently advocate for
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  Speaker 1: reduced sentences and alternatives to imprisonment. They describe the American
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  Speaker 1: prison system as a failure while ignoring the fact that
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  Speaker 1: crime rates declines dramatically as prison populations increased. The argument
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  Speaker 1: that imprisonment doesn't work rests on the false premise that
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  Speaker 1: prisons should rehabilitate criminals rather than simply preventing them from
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  Speaker 1: committing more crimes. When recidivism rates remain high, liberals conclude
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  Speaker 1: that imprisonment has failed. But the primary purpose of imprisonment
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  Speaker 1: is not rehabilitation, it is incapacitation. A criminal who is
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  Speaker 1: in prison cannot rob, rape, or murder innocent people, regardless
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  Speaker 1: of whether his time behind bars has reformed his character.
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  Speaker 1: This is not to say that rehabilitation efforts are worthless,
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  Speaker 1: but rather that they should not be the primary justification
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  Speaker 1: from imprisonment. The first obligation of government is to protect
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  Speaker 1: law abiding citizens from predators. If rehabilitation occurs as a
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  Speaker 1: byproduct of incarceration, that is beneficial, but it should not
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  Speaker 1: be the primary goal. The emphasis on rehabilitation over incapacitation
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  Speaker 1: reflects a broader pattern and liberal thinking about human nature.
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  Speaker 1: Liberals tend to believe that people are basically good and
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  Speaker 1: that criminal behavior results from external circumstances. Rather than individual choices.
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  Speaker 1: This leads them to policies that treat criminals as victims
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  Speaker 1: deserving of sympathy and assistance, rather than as threats to
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  Speaker 1: public safety requiring firm control. Conservative approaches to crime control
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  Speaker 1: rest on different about human nature. These different assumptions lead
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  Speaker 1: to very different policy prescriptions. Conservatives support policies that increase
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  Speaker 1: the certainty and severity of punishment for criminal behavior, while
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  Speaker 1: liberals support policies that emphasize understanding and forgiveness. The evidence
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  Speaker 1: clearly shows which approach is more effective at reducing crime,
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  Speaker 1: but Democrats continue to pursue liberal policies because they fit
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  Speaker 1: their worldview better. The racial dimension of crime adds another
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  Speaker 1: layer of complexity to this issue. Crime rates are disproportionately
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  Speaker 1: high in minority communities, and the vast majority of crime
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  Speaker 1: victims are themselves minorities, Yet Democratic politicians consistently frame law
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  Speaker 1: enforcement as a threat to minority communities rather than as
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  Speaker 1: protection for law abiding minority residents. This framing is both
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  Speaker 1: factually wrong and morally perverse. The residents of high crime
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  Speaker 1: minority and neighborhoods are more likely to be victims of
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  Speaker 1: crime than residents of affluent white neighborhoods. They have the
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  Speaker 1: greatest stake and effective law enforcement, and the most to
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  Speaker 1: lose from liberal policies that allow criminals to operate with impunity,
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  Speaker 1: Yet their voices are consistently ignored in favor of activists
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  Speaker 1: who claim to speak for minority communities while actually representing
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  Speaker 1: the interests of criminals. To defund the police movement that
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  Speaker 1: gained prominence following the death of George Floyd illustrates this
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  Speaker 1: dynamic perfectly. Despite polling that showed strong opposition to reduce
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  Speaker 1: police funding among minority residents of high crime neighborhoods, democratic
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  Speaker 1: politicians embraced the movement's demands. The result was predictable crime
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  Speaker 1: rates increased in cities that reduced police budgets, and the
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  Speaker 1: victims were disproportionately minorities. This reveals the fundamental dishonesty at
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  Speaker 1: the heart of liberal crime policy. When Democrats claim that
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  Speaker 1: aggressive law enforcement is racist, they are essentially arguing that
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  Speaker 1: minority communities should be condemned to live with higher crime
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  Speaker 1: rates than white communities. They are saying that black and
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  Speaker 1: Hispanic victims of crime matter less than the comfort of
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  Speaker 1: criminals who happen to share their race or ethnics, but
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  Speaker 1: truly anti racist approach to crime control would recognize that
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  Speaker 1: all law abiding people, regardless of race, deserve equal protection
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  Speaker 1: from criminals. It would acknowledge that minority communities suffer disproportionately
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  Speaker 1: from crime and therefore have the greatest need for effective
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  Speaker 1: law enforcement. It would reject the soft biguity of low
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  Speaker 1: expectations that assumes minority communities must tolerate higher crime rates.
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  Speaker 1: The international evidence on crime control policies provides additional confirmation
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  Speaker 1: of these points. Countries that have implemented tough law enforcement policies,
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  Speaker 1: such as Singapore and South Korea, have achieved remarkably low
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  Speaker 1: crime rates despite having diverse populations and significant social challenges.
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  Speaker 1: Countries that have emphasized liberal approaches, such as Sweden and
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  Speaker 1: the United Kingdoms, have seen crime rates increase as they
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  Speaker 1: have become more lenient toward criminals. Even within the United States,
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  Speaker 1: the evidence is clear. States and cities that have maintained
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  Speaker 1: or increased their commitment to effective law enforcement have generally
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  Speaker 1: seen crime rates decline, while those that have embraced liberal
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  Speaker 1: policies have struggled with persistent crime problems. This pattern holds
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  Speaker 1: true regardless of other factors such as poverty rates, unemployment,
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  Speaker 1: or demographic composition. The consistency of these patterns across different times, places,
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  Speaker 1: and populations suggests that the effectiveness of tough law enforcement
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  Speaker 1: is not dependent on specific cultural or economic conditions. Rather,
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  Speaker 1: it reflects basic truths about human nature and social organization
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  Speaker 1: that transcend particular circumstances. Yet, despite this overwhelming evidence, democratic
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  Speaker 1: politicians at high crime cities continue to pursue the same
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  Speaker 1: failed policies. They do this not because they are unaware
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  Speaker 1: of the evidence, but because acknowledging it would require them
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  Speaker 1: to abandon cherished beliefs about the nature of crime and
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  Speaker 1: the role of government and addressing it. This intellectual stubbornness
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  Speaker 1: has tragic consequences for the people who live in democratic,
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  Speaker 1: constructive cities. They are forced to endure high crime rates
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  Speaker 1: not because effective solutions don't exist, but because they are
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  Speaker 1: Political leaders are more committed to ideological purity than to
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  Speaker 1: public safety. They are sacrificed on the altar of progressive theory,
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  Speaker 1: while their leaders congratulate themselves for their compassionate and enlightenment.
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  Speaker 1: The path forward requires a fundamental change in how we
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  Speaker 1: think about crime and criminal justice policy. We must abandon
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  Speaker 1: the romanic notion that criminals are victims of circumstances beyond
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  Speaker 1: their control and acknowledge that crime is primarily a result
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  Speaker 1: of individual choices. We must recognize that the first obligation
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  Speaker 1: of government is to protect law abiding citizens, not to
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  Speaker 1: provide services to criminals. We must base our policies on
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  Speaker 1: evidence of what works, rather than on theories of what
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  Speaker 1: should work. This does not mean abandoning all efforts to
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  Speaker 1: address the social conditions that may contribute to crime. Programs
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  Speaker 1: that provide education, job training, and other opportunities for law
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  Speaker 1: abiding people can play a valuable role in crime prevention,
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  Speaker 1: but these efforts must be secondary to the primary tasks
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  Speaker 1: of incapacitating criminals who choose to prey upon others. It
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  Speaker 1: also does not mean treating all criminals with equal harshness.
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  Speaker 1: The justice system should distinguish between first time offenders who
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  Speaker 1: may benefit from rehabilitation and career criminals who pose a
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  Speaker 1: continuing threat to public safety, but this distinction must be
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  Speaker 1: based on evidence of individual behavior rather than on theoretical
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  Speaker 1: assumptions about the causes of crime. Most importantly, it means
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  Speaker 1: holding democratic politicians accountable for the consequences of their policies.
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  Speaker 1: Voters in high crime cities must stop rewarding failure with reelection.
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  Speaker 1: They must demand leaders who prioritize public safety over ideological conformity,
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  Speaker 1: and who are willing to implement policies that have been
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  Speaker 1: proven to work. The alternative has continued decay of our
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  Speaker 1: cities and the continued victimization of innocent people who deserve
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  Speaker 1: better from their government. The choice is ours to make,
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  Speaker 1: but we must make it based on evidence rather than
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  Speaker 1: wishful thinking. The lives and safety of millions of Americans
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  Speaker 1: depend on getting this right. We owe them nothing less
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  Speaker 1: than our most honest and rigorous analysis of what has
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  Speaker 1: worked and what has not. Only then can we begin
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  Speaker 1: to build safer, more prosperous communities for all Americans, regardless
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  Speaker 1: of their race, income, or political affiliation. The time for
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  Speaker 1: excuses and explanations has passed. The time for effective action
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  Speaker 1: is now. The question is whether we have the wisdom
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  Speaker 1: and courage to act on what we know to be true,
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  Speaker 1: or whether we will continue to sacrifice public safety on
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  Speaker 1: the altar of political correctness. The choice, as always is
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  Speaker 1: ours to make.