>> tell me what you and your generation think is gonna to happen. i'm antonio mora, goodnight. when crime was high, a generation with highest levels of incarcerations, now that state budgets are under pressure, and the crime is lower, is the country open to rethinking prison policies.

incarceration nation - it's "inside story". woil to "inside story", i'm ray suarez. there was a mass shooting thursday at a military reserve center in chattanooga, tennessee. four u.s. marines were killed, along with a gunman who has been identified as 24-year-old mohammed. -- mohammod youssuf abdulazeez. he was not on the radar of law enforcement. the fbi is looking at his motive. al jazeera will follow that. tonight we focus on what we call incarceration nation. palay was the first sitting president to visit a federal prison, going to a correctional institution in oklahoma, where he noted the role on the war on

drugs began in the '60s, in the inmates. >> a primary cif of this mass incarceration phenomenon is the drug laws. we have to consider whether this is the smartest way for us to control crime and rehabilitate palestinianers prisoners. governments at all levels are taking a closer look at sentencing, though it comes a little late for sum. in 2004, this man was in the wrong place at the wrong time. the unintended target of an fbi sting. the stuj told him it was -- judge told him it was a stroke

of bad luck leading to his conviction of carrying 50 grams of cocaine. >> i needed to sit down saying you did the wrong thing, you need to get your life together. i didn't need that much time. >> reporter: wade who was 25, was sentenced to 20 years in federal prison, and will be freed on july 28th of this year, not 2024. >> i have an email saying that the president decided to commute the sentence of 22 individuals. i'm going through the list to see if there was anybody on it i know. mine. >> in march president obama commuted wade's". he and others, charged with drug offenses were serving life. >> their punishments didn't fit the crime. if they were sentenced under

today's laws nearly all would have served their time. i made clear to them that re-entering society was a responsibility on their part, and hard work and smarter choices >> the latest commutations brings the total to 89, more than the last four presidents. part of a push to reverse the tough on crime measures enacted since the 1980s as part of the war on drugs. there are republicans and democrats behind the drive. including bill clinton, putting his name to some of the sentences when he was in office. >> up. long. >> more reduced sentences pay come as the nation grapples with overcrowded prisons. more than 2 mill were in prison. up from 500,000.

more than 3,000 served life without parole for non-violent drug crimes, costing the u.s. $80 billion to keep people locked up. >> our system goes beyond that and is a system of mass incarceration that needs to be reigned in. >> with 18 months left in office, president obama, at a speech to the n.a.a.c.p. agenda. our criminal justice system is not as smart as it should be, it's not keeping us as safe as it should be, it's not as fair as it should be. mass incarceration makes the country worse off. it. >> that includes, according to the president, abolishing or reducing mandatory sentences, or non-violent drug crimes.

even allowing future ex-cons to vote and block employers from asking about their histories. >> it's a hard stance on let's get tough on crime is not working. it creates a one size fits all solution to a problem that i don't think they really understand. you can't just incarcerate the problem away. >> joining me now the professor from the school of law. is the programme driven by the war on drugs. it's laying on a rush. >> absolutely. in the 1990s, something called the bill clinton law, what is

known as the crime though. in the crime belt. you have to remember that at this time, in the early 1990s, that it was really when crack cocaine, and the urban areas in the country. crime was rampant than it is today. and democrats, republicans and the like were responding and the reality that there was a crime problem those policies, in addition to increasing mandatory minimums, increasing laws on the books, all combined. what they did was capture more and more people in the

system. from the early 1970s. we quarantined many. we have a dubious destinks of being the prison capital world. we imprisoned more people in this country than any other nation on the planet. >> the president was this a federal penitentiary. his range of movement was limited. if you look at prisoners across the country, a small are in federal lock-up, aren't they? only a little more than 200,000 are in the federal system. 90% are in state prisons. how far, the president has down a lot in terms of he recently announced clemency, initiative,

and has worked with former attorney holder to enact the smart on climb initiative. the president has done a lot in his administration over the last few years to focus the americans and improve the dialogue. it is part of the discussion, you have those running for president talking about how to improve the criminal just system. and the candidates running for president is talking about how to end mass incarceration, how to reduce the criminal incarcerations. the president is limited in a certain respect because so much of the population is in another state. he is the leader of the country, and is getting out there and giving speeches. no president visited a federal prison in this country. he's setting - you know, he's setting the bar here, and he's

letting americans know that we have a real problem in the country. mass incarcerations impacts 2.3 million americans, but impacts their families. 2.7 million children have a parent. so many that on sesame street there is a character alex whose parent is incarcerated. 4 million of those people can't vote because of the criminal record. the speech that he gave the past week, it really shows that of the president unders that mass incarceration is hurting our country, and that there are real racial disparities in the criminal justice system, that we addition. >> if the law changes around a penalty for which you have been convicted, and you are going time, you don't automatically admit your sentence reduced, do

you? >> absolutely not. it depends on the law and the sentence. some laws are past retroactively, meaning that if you are in prison currently, while the law is passed, you might receive the benefit of that law. not all laws actually function that way. retroactive. >> you have to begin a legal release? >> you would, yes. certain laws are passed retroactively. the sentencing act that may be reduced, the crack cocaine disparities. there are people who will receive a retroactive benefit for some of those sentences. but there are some laws that are changed, unfortunately, while someone is serving, and they may not reap the benefit.

>> lauren, a senior counsel in the brennan center justice programme where her work focuses on legal reform. thank you for joining us. >> there may be growing recognition that locking up more people than any country on earth has its flaws, it's not clear how you undo that approach. what do you do with ageing men that have not been free for decade, to you how do you design >> al jazeera's investigative unit has tonight's exclusive report. >> stories that have impact. that make a difference. that open your world. >> this... is what we do. >> america tonight. tuesday through friday 10:00 eastern. only on al jazeera america.

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mark, is there a long-tail problem, because new people are coming in at the front end all the time, and the people sentences a long time ago still in. mass incarceration is a function. they are sending more people to prison. we lead the world in incarceration and parole possibilities. numbers are stacking up, suggesting that, yes, we need to divert people from prison if we want to reduce numbers, and look at how long we keep people in prison, and is that a smart way to go. >> if you put two grafts, one over the other, one shows crime going down during the same

period as the number of inmates are going up. why wouldn't americans conclude that putting a lot of americans in gaol could help the crime rate go down. >> our legal culture, pilot call and social culture normalized human caging. when you cage so many humans, you are addicted to it. a lot of people clzs by virtue of the commonsense assumption that when you are looking up so many people, crime must be going down. that assumption is false. there's not a single shred of evidence that locking human being in cages for minor offences reduces the crime that happens, there's an anti-seatent question that is important to answer, to what degree was crime a problem when the laws were passed. it's less of a prab and fewer death are are caused by what we

thing of as crime and criminality than are caused by inequality in financial markets and traffic accidents and dui. many are causing death. we didn't rush to cage people who produce secrets or a small segment of the population. millions belong in the segment. it's poor racial minorities. the reason people concluded that was because of who it was happening to, to the most people. >> if you change the sentencing formulas tomorrow and faxed every judge in the country, wouldn't we lie with a high rate time? >> very high rates. there are proposals saying we should have a 50% reduction in prison

population. if we did that, our rate of incarceration would still be that of westernized nations. unless we do saying about people serving time many long past the point in which they could be the threat to safety. reduction. >> will it take an argument to be made to society that the money saved could be spent on keeping them being criminals. >> we need a social movement that changes the way we think. we have to understand and tell the stories of

human being. >> they are dangers places full of rape and infectious disease. until we understand what we subject people to, and understand there's not a threat of evidence subjecting people to those actions, until we understand that, i don't think arguments about cost will help the public make the changes that mark suggested are needed, even to bring us in line with other countries. >> stay with us. it's all well and good to support in prince approximately. is there the political will and the money. is there the money to help them reintegrate in society. >> i think we're into something that's bigger than us >> that's the pain your mother

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"inside story". welcome back to story". i'm ray suarez. president obama visited a inmates. the first sitting president to do so. he's been fielding requests for clemency, pardons, and has been speaking out about unfairness in the criminal justice system. 89 commutations don't represent a dent when we look at ways to reform a system keeping mon than 2.4 million behind bars. incarceration nation. this time, alec and mark are with me. you heard what alec said before the break. if we change the way we handle this part of common life, don't we have to make a solid argument to the public that elects the procedures, and the elected officials who make sentencing guide lines? >> we need to make a broad

public education argument. it's true, we have seen public movements throughout history. most are not won on cost effective arguments, or dollar ground. table. >> i think it's a growing interest in evidence based bream work. we are kauking about better ways to treat human being, behaviours when it's prison that promotes public safety, one doesn't harm it, what else could you do. effective. >> is it a time that introduce the kinds of reforms at a time when crime is low, when public fear around the issues is not as amped up as it was in the late

80s, and early 90s. there was a lot of effort to make the public think that they were constantly in fear and danger. it was a propaganda effort for people that wanted to for various reasons, wanted to increase the prison and gaol population, and we are a little more sophisticated. we have seen them do that, and we have the wherewithal to respond in ways we hadn't before. we haven't mobleized an -- mobilized an engage public that is understanding of the issues sold to us on the promise that it will make us better. we have seen that it is a cruel joke. it is a time where we have learnt from our mistakes, we let them do this to us before, and will not let them do it again. it happens to be a time of reduced crime rates. i think they are dangerous

statistics to rely on because of people that prepare them. >> they drive public sentiment. and i'm thinking about the political blow back, the first time a prominent prosecutor has to face a public that nose someone that got out early, has committed a crime, it's inevitable. >> those things will happen. the more we institutionalize different ways of approaching the problem, people have sense that we can take a certain level of risk in doing something. it's not like the system is performing at peak efficiency, it is performing miserably. as we get judges, prosecutors and communities invested in saying let's put people with a drug problem into treatment, let's have people do community service instead of sending them to

the local gaol. the more connected, we can situations. >> can you put muscle behind public sentiment to build a little protection around people that take a chance. >> i think there's a lot of goodwill. when political leaders get up and speak from the heart and research. i think a lot of people will say it's an american thing. i don't like what he's saying, but i can understand what he's doing, and i respect him for it. >> mark and alec, thank you both. i'll be back in a minute with a final thought about the punish the fitting the crime. you are watching "inside story".

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for a crowd-pleasing politician, there's rarely been much traction in promising voters to gaol fewer poem, and

when you must, do it for less time. sentencing laws are sticky. once you seat high laws, in practice they come down more slowly than they arise. that is true as urban neighbourhoods were less scary. and remained so, high rates of long-term incarcerations in many communities, it starred to be less true when more and more cash-strapped states started to take the steadily climbing cost of imprisonment seriously, especially as more members start to enter their most expensive years of care. what do you know? it's easier to think clearly about equal justice under law when there's serious dough on the table. if politicians are not scrambling like bidders at an auction, it may not be important

how they got there. i'm ray suarez, that's the nds story -- "inside story". on"america tonight"... >> we had someone viciously attack at two different locations people who proudly served our country. >> the the deaths of four marines and fears where the investigation may lead. >> we are conduct having as an act of domestic terrorism and the question - how to protecthe when and women of our armed forces on home soil. >> we have been in contact with the depa