california to florida. why can't they figure out a a way to get these contraceptives to women that does not involve nuns. they put a man on the moon but are forcing a little sisters a little sisters to violate their conscience and pay for drugs and devices that they objective. that is unprecedented. >> losing sight of the idea of balance. it is not for us to question necessarily the reasonableness of the nuns unwillingness or anyone's unwillingness to fill out a form. we balance interests. there are other people at stake. there are employees who will go without coverage of the nuns will fill out the form. and the say, well, the government to pay for it the government to pay for anything. we would now say that i have a religious objection to pain woman the same as men. we would never say the government has money.

no big deal. we are going to enforce equal pay laws. we would not say i have a religious objection to pay minimum wage. no big deal. the government can make up the salary difference. let alone saying i refuse to fill out a form. the question about the conscientious objector was absolutely right. notre dame's lawyer todd is does that mean it would be a substantial burden on religious exercise? and he said yes. even that would have to be considered a substantial burden. and that is all well and good. when someone else is losing an important benefit as a results come and that is when the has to be balance. the idea that i am entitled every possible idiosyncrasy in my beliefs is fine but as a result of those other

people's benefits that is when it crosses the line. >> we are going to leave it there. clearly not something we will be able to resolve. let's try to find areas where both sides may agree more. the most recent example that i think i have looked at is the hold against house case. maybe that is an area where more yes both agree. >> yes. we do agree. christine is organization the muslim prisoner who want to wear a half-inch beard in prison. the case was brought under that religious land

use and to slice persons acts. we disagree on how to pronounce the acronym. even then we have disagreements, but that was a case in which -- that was the sort of situation about the coalition together. a modest religious accommodation that is important to someone's religious beliefs. and granting the accommodation does not harm anyone. i think that is a case where we agree religious accommodation laws are serving intent. it would have been different if it was i have a religious right to not associate with women prison guards. i will cross over into imposing religious beliefs and someone else. the quintessential accommodation does not hurt anyone. no reason not to granted. yes. there's plenty of room for agreement about those cases. >> the reason that the

supreme court ruled that this present have the right to grow the beard command was because the state of arkansas had no real reason. the state of arkansas had said you cannot grow the beard. you have to shave because we said so. that was the weakness of the argument. in the case of many of the religious freedom cases we are seeing the ones where we are defending our client is because often times the government says you have to do this because we said so's many cases where the government had no real reason to not make an accommodation and not make an exemption. yet in the end we do agree that this was an important case. barry lynn who started americans united. >> it was done to made to please the. >> you look good. so for instance larson the

university -- universal church of christ. fourteen passes in a state of north carolina from the same denomination supported by americans united are suing the state because same-sex marriage is not legal. what these pastors want is their day in court. that is what the religious freedom restoration act as. they give a day in court when there is disagreement. >> let's try to get off a referendum. >> at that we wanted to. >> we want to talk about other things. the religious accommodation cases becoming more difficult? as we become an increasingly pluralistic is that creating a pluralism anxiety? and are we getting to a

situation now where the religious accommodation cases may become difficult to deal with? >> i do think that there is more mistake here. it only individual and that one of the main roles. other social institutions. and then there is an approach that i would call principal pluralism that says a committee of communities that allow people to seek a vision of the good consistent with the common good is actually a positive thing. has a positive value.

so i do think it really matters what perspective perspective or political philosophic perspective you bring to these issues. i come from a more conservative burke inside that says in fact the most important institutions are not the state and more than the individual can't that the institutions in which individual -- the individual is shaped morality is passed culture is -- the standards of the culture are created and that the government has a positive role to nurture that pluralism. so i do think that there are some deep political philosophic disagreements behind it that won't be solved by appealing to the details of cases. >> how do we deal with pluralism in an increasingly diverse society? >> very carefully. i think at the end of the

day there needs to be humility and empathy. those are -- the word empathy is derided in some circles but i think it is important. i think it is important on both sides. we are a diverse society and we cannot always get everything we want. sometimes we should give what we want and sometimes we should. i think what has disturbed me and many of my colleagues about the weaponization of religious freedom restoration act that we pronounce the same way. but the idea that my rights are different when my ability to act 100 percent

in accordance with my religious beliefs is different than when i met church them when i'm out of business. when i am a church if i want to pray with only people of the same race and religion and sexual orientation i can't. if i open a once counter for ma caterer even if i devoutly believe interracial marriage is wrong i still can't turn away that couple. i think at the end of the day we need to recognize that there are other people out there and that religious beliefs are extremely important and extremely deeply held an extremely devout but in a country based on secular law they can be a trump card. that can be a painful thing, but it is an important limiting principle that is necessary to balance everyone's rights. >> can i add one point? i agree strongly that a democracy is designed for

disagreement but it is underlined by mutual contempt. actually, emphasis on civility empathy is an important part of discussion i was just in salt lake city utah talking with some church officials. they really did attempt to process by which church officials met with gay-rights activists and legislators in a difficult negotiation to come up with an approach. the utah law which is an exchange of sorts. it specifically protects gay people from public accommodations which was regarded by the side there is real but then specifically protects the ability of religious institutions to maintain their identity. jonathan was involved in that effort and hopes it may

be a model for some other states. it could be. the possibility of civil disagreement and at least minimal agreement on some very basic ground rules of pluralism. >> and we are talking about civility with also talk about what was it one time at one time considered to be the repository for civility the college campus. there is a lot going on right now in terms of religious liberty and free exercise in college campuses is the approach being taken on the campuses of providing access to everybody religiously affiliated organizations the right approach? is there enough respect for civil discourse on the campuses now?

to the campuses do better? >> well, greg is the expert on this issue. but i think it is closely associated to the points you have made having to do with civility and empathy and accommodation. when my parents 1st came to the united states we lived in a tiny teeny house in puerto rico where a mother have my mother had been in the concentration camp in germany my father was cuban. they had some bad experiences. and whenever we sat down for dinner my father would close the one window in the kitchen puerto rico 1960s. i was very young. very hot in the house. he would say just in case. case. and he was so afraid that our discussions will be overheard by her neighbor. and as he understood that this is not the way we live in the united states and we open a window he drank from

the fountain of freedom of expression. we cannot disagree enough and yell loudly enough. we cannot drink enough from that. and the reality is this offer as much civility for we want clever as much empathy as we want sexual minorities particularly and religious minorities have mutually reinforce all claims against larger society, and there society, and there are some issues associated with human identity that are so important and vital that no government should punches, no regulation should touch it. and so much for civility. when it comes to matters of human identity the government should protect them not invade them. religious liberty is the ability to live according to our deeply held convictions, live according to our conscience. whether that takes you to organize religion or no religion at all there is no room for government intrusion. the same thing should apply at colleges and universities it has become the trend that

if your group does not agree with larger society for whatever reason then you should not be allowed on campus. that is wrong. tears of the fabric of american society and of freedom when someone's view is held so repulsive that it is not allowed in society. >> let me take a step back. i think i heard -- i think there is a lot of what christine has said's. i want to start with the college campus. i think the specific issue that was being alluded to as many colleges will recognize student groups which gives you access to certain resources and what not. and in order to take advantage of that you have to have basically a nondiscrimination policy. there has been an objection by certain religious groups either involving exclusion of people of other religions are gays and lesbians.

the supreme court held that even a public university can enforce its nondiscrimination policy on student groups. even in those cases student groups can use university facilities. and i think what christina says is it is a religious group that should be able to exclude people. and i think -- i guess where she and i disagree on this issue and the broader issue is that we don't live in a 100 percent libertarian society. we balance individual liberty with other interests. things like equality and nondiscrimination and especially in the unique environment of an educational institution it is reasonable for a university to a university to say, if you want to have a university recognize student group we're going to require you not to discriminate. doesn't mean you can't worship are we want in your dorm room or wherever else but if you want to take advantage of university

facilities is reasonable to say you have a nondiscrimination policy. i think this touches on a broader issue we have never had this religious belief say you can do whatever you want no matter what. the civil rights act reduces individual liberty. you cannot turn away african-americans from your barbecue place. there is there is a case that went up to the supreme court called piggy park. in addition to being delightful to say involved a restaurant owner who said i have a sincerely held religious belief that prevents me from serving african-americans and i want a religious exemption from the civil rights act. the supreme court left them out of court. you know and so at the end of the day yes we need to create space. even at the park guy if he wants to worship as segregated church can do so but i think we have to recognize that we are dealing with diversity, balancing interests. when appropriate for certain settings is not necessarily

appropriate for other settings like the commercials for your command we really have to do our best to reconcile interest and not allow any one of them to be a total trump card. >> i would only add that there can be a human cost to this kind of controversy. a few years ago some human trafficking programs that were located at the catholic bishops were denied funding by the obama administration because of other policies they help. i think that was a real cost look at a case like gordon college in massachusetts that has worked for years with the local lower income school district devoted 14000 men hours of volunteer work's every year when the school district is made a decision because the religious views on other topics they are discontinuing that contact.

there are children who suffer in a circumstance like this. so i think there can be particularly when it comes to the provision of social services many of which come through private and religious institutions in america and partnership. age who rigorous application of some of these points human series -- serious human cost. >> the vegetarian group should be able to say that the leader has to be a vegetarian. the women's feminist group should demand that its leadership the women feminists demand a christian or muslim group should say can anyone can come none of our clients have said that they discriminate against anyone. they want their leadership to abide by the mission of the club. what are we supposed to make everything vanilla? as a latina i particularly

love when race comes into the issue. the racial card does not need to get played on any of these. yes, our their despicable people that have claims religious reasons to have certain views? yes. but those cases have not want. in the last 22 years it has been said repeatedly there is not one single exemption based on a claim. that case was settled in the supreme court with the bob jones decision. so will people say crazy things? yes. yes. that is why they go to court. use that extreme example and justify government intrusion into these groups. does not make sense. >> what is happening the argument that was made to justify racial segregation and racial exclusion in the 60s and 70s is now being made when it comes to gays and lesbians. i think that is the parallel not saying christina is a racist. what i am saying is look

why can't i run my business according to my religious beliefs? those are precisely the arguments that were made with respect to race and interracial marriage in the 60s and 60s and 70s. if they were rejected then as they were in as they should have them they should be rejected now when it comes to gay and lesbian couples facing the same type of obstacles. >> name one case and last 22 years when a gay person was refused service based on a religious claim? >> the cases are in the early stages but your organization that your organization is in court arguing that they should win. there was a case in new mexico in which a photographer refused to photograph of same-sex wedding ceremony. she brought a claim. the court rejected the claim and said -- and christina's

organization filed a friend of the court brief saying that the photographer under the state riffraff should be able to deny service. the new mexico supreme court said the statute can't be invoked by a private wedding vendor. the language was changed. i think it's fine. if your organization wants to support this people great. but to then turn around and say it's not about discrimination while your arguing in court it is like you want to be able to withhold your cake and eat it too. which is it? >> let's talk about those people. we're running out of time. we are running out of time. >> this day client provided flowers for many months consistently. all she could not do was participate in the wedding ceremony. in a state where same-sex marriage was not even legal at the time the court ruled that it was the price of citizenship.

elaine who lost her business and her livelihood or the gay couple who could have gone to any other forest in the state. >> and all i would say is that your entitled to the view, but you cannot then turn around and say these laws to allow discrimination because you were in court. >> we are going to give mike the last word. actually, i'm going to give eugene the almost last word. he wrote about whether there are mutual duties of accommodation. and so we have heard very strong articulation to different positions. just because you have a right, should you exercise it? are their mutual duties of accommodation that we need to be thinking about? >> i think it is quite possible that religious belief and ethical

conscience would dictate taking the cake. in a society where you would allow some very small exceptions for people not to make the cake, that is the nature of pluralism. and it does not implicate the broad accommodation for housing and businesses and other things. but, you know, be that as it may i guess we'll we are talking about is where those decisions are made's and whether there is a decision to be made at all. the traditional view has been that there is a balancing test you. there are actually two rights involved. the courts have been the place where those decisions were made. and so's all that said it is

very important that people win graciously and democracy and lose graciously. people are going to lose in this case. how people lose will make a large difference. >> with that i want to thank our speakers on and the national constitution center for hosting us today. >> former new york governor governor george pataki announced his candidacy today for the republican presidential nomination 1st on youtube and then in an event in new hampshire.

he is the 8th republican to declare, declare and you can see his comments tonight at 8:00 o'clock eastern. and then at 9:00 o'clock 9:00 o'clock scientists and journalists examine the phenomenon known as science to nihilism. >> you know i was one of the regular hosts for the universe. they would present a show i was doing about asteroids or possible life on martian a scientific perspective and then have ancient aliens on right after it. [laughter] and they would be presenting these things is equivalent. and and this was enough to make me stop working with the history channel. the strange thing is

somebody call me a nasa and said zero my god. is it true the world will end next week to mecca have been dealing with a lot of this. i've sort of had enough. do you think i would be here in my office answering the phone if i thought the world was ending in a week? i said start getting worried when all the scientists by at the expense of wine and max out their credit cards and go to some tropical island. this idea that i am not a person that i that i don't have feelings and emotions and the family and the reasonably alive that i would not react emotionally if i knew the war was coming to an end what an odd disconnect. someone wants to separate being a scientist from the fact that your human being. >> that was part of the annual world affairs conference.

you can see the entire conversation tonight starting at 9:00 o'clock eastern. >> while congress continues its holiday break each night we we're taking the opportunity here to show you book tv programs normally seen only on weekends. tonight authors and books about waging war. diane preston.

>> the 150th anniversary of the civil war. again that is on c-span 3:78 o'clock eastern. >> the justice department director and black lives matter cofounder to partner discussion today on incarceration, the criminal justice incarceration, the criminal justice system and race. the event examines receptive have reversed the trend of overcome opposition. this is us this is us about the center for american progress and is about an hour and a half.

[inaudible conversations] >> good morning. my name is winnie steckel berg, executive vice president of external affairs here the center for american progress. thank you all for joining us today for our important conversation about criminal justice reform. we are so very proud to be hosting it. the united states is the world's leader in incarceration with 2.2 million people currently in the nation's jails and prisons. of 500 percent increase over the past 30 years. these trends have resulted in prison overcrowding at a rapidly expanding penal system despite increasing evidence that large-scale incarceration is not the

most effective means of achieving public safety. while acknowledging the need to continue working toward keeping our community safe the impact of over criminalization and over incarceration resonates throughout our country. between 70 and 100 million americans for as many as one in three other, record a criminal history carries lifelong barriers that can block successful reentry and participation in our society this has broad implications not only for the millions of individuals who are prevented from moving on with their lives and becoming productive citizens but also for their families communities and the national economy. today a criminal record serves as both a direct cause and consequence of our poverty presenting obstacles to employment housing,

public assistance education family reunification and more. one recent study finds that our nation's poverty rate would have dropped by 20 percent from 1980 to 2,004 if not for mass incarceration and subsequent criminal records that hot people for years after they have paid their debt to society. in fact, a criminal record makes achieving economic security nearly impossible. the impact of mass incarceration on communities of color is particularly staggering and is a significant driver of racial inequality in the united states. people people of color make up more than 60 percent of the population behind bars. recent events and in baltimore and other american cities highlighted many of the challenges facing our communities. high poverty lack of opportunity and rampant inequality.

they have also shown a light on serious questions about police practices and the tensions between our community members and the law enforcement officials sworn to protect them hoping to further fuel the call for comprehensive criminal justice reform. the center for american progress and to the criminal justice reform space to add our voice and resources to the vital policy debate and the efforts to reform the criminal justice system at the state and federal level. we. we're working to make the criminal justice system more equitable and fair. this work includes urging policy changes that would keep our communities safe while ending mass incarceration over criminalization particularly as it impacts poor communities and communities of color, supporting policies that remove barriers to

socioeconomic opportunities for those with criminal records and supporting ways to address the racial and socioeconomic inequities within the criminal justice system itself. many many of the reforms being discussed would actually promote and enhance the safety of our communities. we are prou to be collaborating to present today's discussion of how we can begin to reverse the trend of overcome causation of people of color and address its lasting consequences, including reforming consequences including reforming policing practices and removing barriers to opportunity for people with criminal records you are in for a treat today next pastor michael mcbride who will deliver some opening remarks. pastor mike will then be followed by heather and thompson, professor of history at the university of michigan who recently served on the national academy of sciences blue ribbon panel that studies the causes and

consequences of mass incarceration. she will then she we will then present the panel's findings. finally todd cox senior fellow for criminal justice reform will lead a fantastic panel discussion on these issues. thank issues. thank you for being here and i will now turn it over. [applause] >> it is good to be here. certainly we are glad to be able to partner once again with the center for american progress. i certainly am a black preacher. i we will read my remarks because i i can easily become intoxicated with the exuberance of my own verbosity. they tell me i have a time limit. one day a man was walking he quickly jumped into the water to pull the baby out. another woman walking down the river bank saw another

baby in the water. she jumped in. there were more baby floating down the river's. they both began to jump in and pull them out. after engaging in these life-saving acts they realize they're were still babies coming down the river. they looked at each other and said we have to go as far upstream to find out who exactly is doing these babies in the water. this is a metaphor for how many of us community members all of us who find ourselves caught in the current use this metaphor to help remind us that our quest for seeking justice were too many loved ones are drowning tar river of lack of opportunity, over criminalization,

incarceration, violence that we have a a responsibility to not just have conversations but to go as far upstream as we can to change the system, structures command conditions that make these realities possible. i believe we have a sacred moment and unique occasion the rise up and meet this challenge because the blood of the innocents are crying out us from the street. the pain of the excluded are reverberating from city to city and the demands for reform and even in some places revolution a bubbling up from every corner of our country. and yet all of us who are participating in these efforts' must resist the urge to take the easy way out by reaching for the lowest hanging fruit and doing what i call a race to the bottom rather than achieving the kind of transformative structural reform and change that i believe our families deserve

sadly i believe we have not yet risen to the challenge. i come here today just a few days remove from participating national days of action to say her name, highlight the many many women who are being lost to state violence and the response of our city leaders who claim to be progressive democrats similar to the response of many others. polanco progressive leadership and it was the response of tear gas, arrested detainment intimidation military style weapons and tactics that i believe should not be in the streets of our neighborhood which brings me to this quote that doctor king said.

where he says i have almost reached the regrettable conclusion that the negroes great stumbling block in their stride toward freedom is not the ku klux klan but the white moderate who is more devoted to order the justice. today i will modify the white moderate to include black moderates. reached a place of power and privilege that makes us more inclined to reach for order them for justice. this is why in our work we believe that every revolution must 1st be an intern revolution. a revolution of our values arts minds, and so. indeed on our watch the prison industrial complex has quintupled. indeed on our watch we have seen the expansion of the criminalization people of color taking a many manifestations including the internalizing of that even in our own communities and the concrete housing of that

in the public. these conditions have reached a tragic concern level and i believe as people of faith we are not just fighting for the future of our country. they are fighting for the soul of our nation. determined to bring a moral imperative and prophetic declaration of these conversations. we have listened the thousands of voices. we have attempted to help facilitate the coalescing of demand the concerns. we believe that we believe that these strategies will continue to inform our countries coming out of the wilderness of mass causation and hopefully's leading us into a future where all of us are able to live free from incarceration, violence, and exclusion.

some of you will hear very powerful voices the day that we have gathered in partnership with the center for american progress. many of these folks are leaders in their own right. we are blessed and humbled that they have joined the very informative. we want to stand up to for scalable movement that is grounded in the truth that all black lives matter brown lives matter the lives of poor and marginalized people are not expendable in this democracy we will continue to believe that those are created a policy apparatus that makes mass criminalization possible should not have a a free path to superintend the process to restructure repair and heal heart. many why in the collective experiences and wisdom of those who have endured these react -- realities and still

have the love and resilience to stand up proudly and proclaim and fight for their own freedom. for the 3rd time we we will participate leading into the white house to ask for an executive order's to make sure some 30 million jobs can be available to those who have served their time and are now in need of full inclusion. we will go to the senate house, senate house and carry these messages. we invite you all to join us as we raise this banner as we go as far upstream as we possibly can and meet the occasion is before us. they killed the profit. i guess some of them were mad. i want to live a little while longer.

i can't stand it in margaret special meetings, conferences, weekly worship services. meetings for this call meetings for that. you have one me out. i i am sick of your religion. you go right on doing one. he put on your next performance in prayer and speaking i we will not be listening. you want to know why? he have been tearing people to pieces in your hands a bloody. go home, wash up, clean up your act act sweep your lives clean of evil doings. i don't have to look at them any longer. say no to ron. learn to do good. work for justice. help the down and out. stand up for the homeless. go to bat for the defenseless. this is the moral call that we are bringing to this work and are excited it's to be making these journeys.

god bless you. let's have a great conversation today. [applause] >> good morning. i am on it to be with you this morning to offer you an overview of a report that i have the honor to participate in my two-year study that we think will be helpful to all of us interested in doing the important and vital work of criminal justice reform. i was privileged to serve as a member of the consensus panel to address one of the most important issues of our nation the fourfold increase in rates of incarceration. our task was to examine and come up with recommendations for how we might remedy it. our panel is convened by the national research council and organized by the national academy of sciences

and asked -- and esteemed organization chartered by congress in 1863 by the lincoln administration. its intent was to serve as a a source of independent research-based advice to the government and to society. in this case the research was assembled by a group of panelists, 20 scholars were on the country who came together over two years with a very specific charge. the specific charge was to ask these questions. what changes in us society and public policy drove the rise of incarceration? what consequences of these changes had for crime rates? what effect does incarceration have on those in confinement? and what are the implications for public policy of the evidence on causes and effects?

are report was subject to anonymous external review by groups of scholars and policy experts following the rigorous review procedures of the national research council, and the council and the reason i mentioned that is because we hope this report will arm you can help you to give the information you might need to take your communities and help you to go forth. let me quickly highlight our main conclusions. some of these we will be obvious. we hope to give it some weight's. our 1st conclusion is that the gross incarceration rates' historically unprecedented and internationally unique. historically unprecedented because you might notice the incarceration rate remains relatively stable until suddenly it didn't want to just went through the roof. indeed we are an international outlier of virtually any country and indeed today we now have more people in prison than

any other country. it is also important that we recognize formerly that this incarceration did not fall evenly on all americans. severely racially disproportionate and include the mentally ill and was overwhelmingly inclusive of people living in poverty. incarceration rates for incarceration rates for african americans is been for after six naptime's higher than whites. incarceration rates for hispanic have been two to three times higher. the committee found that the chart is stratified by levels of education. the incarceration rate for black men with little schooling is more than 100 times higher than for white men who had been to college. beginning beginning with a historical perspective and are report which we invite you to read download an access fully explored many things. how is it that we came to

this turn of events? we underline and located several causes. crime rates did begin to rise. we did not locate that so much. we located this in a policy decision. policymakers, politicians responding to civil rights unrest, responding to demands from the streets and deciding that disorder and crime were synonymous was a political decision and as a political decision that is something we can change. we also talked about the direct causes. to the drug war we also overhauled sentencing. sentencing was a direct cause of so many -- such a high rate of incarceration. indeed the volatile political environment provided fertile ground.

we discussed and we discussed and went through indeterminate sentencing, laws reducing judge discretion sentencing laws and so forth. the bottom line is that we chose this policy and that choice right best changes to our country the primary being these unprecedented incarceration rates. the thing is if we chose it that means we can on shoes it. the research indicates very strong reasons why we must's first of all increase incarceration rates did not relate to a depreciable declining crime. a very important finding particularly when taking this argument to the committee. indeed not only did it not lead to an appreciable decline in crime was not correlated to a climbing crime that we also found that it did not have strong deterrent effect. long sentences did not have strong deterrent effect and therefore had its own negative impact.

yet if it did not work it certainly had a lot of other negative impacts which we also document in the report. we know for example it had a terrible effect on people within prison and that it had a terrible effect on communities outside of prison. i won't belabor these. of course everything from severe unemployment rising rates of poverty weakening of family bonds for children losing parents command i can go forward. this all adds up to our main conclusion that we have gone past the.where the numbers of people in prison can be justified many potential benefit and indeed the consequences have been so far-reaching it will be quite a task to undo it. i will leave you with principles that we also came to based on research for relatively normative principles.

we hope that these we will arm us as we go forward. we have policy recommendations as well which i invite you to look at. we we suggest that these policies need to be informed by certain principles. these are principles that we hold important as americans living in a democracy. the principle of proportionality requires the people who have committed crimes should be sentenced and proportion to the severity of the crime. the principle of parsimony requires the confinement should never be greater than necessary to achieve legitimate social purpose. the committee observed that many of the sentencing statutes enacted over the four decades previous failed to observe any of these long-standing democratic jurisprudential principles. the principle of citizenship which requires humane treatment of those in prison and has been embraced by the international community federal courts in numerous places that we have abandoned and indeed these

principles have been strained by the current corrections policies and practices. finally, our committee which is very much based in science to my rigorous review of literature came up with the overwhelming principle of social justice which would require the prisons should be viewed as social institutions that must not undermine the well-being of members of society. indeed pursuing indeed pursuing this principle would require greater retention oversight, transparency, and more. again these guiding principles strengthened our overriding recommendations that we must reverse course and reduce the levels of incarceration and then we had actual's -- i'm sorry, policy recommendations overhauling sentencing policy recommending that we eliminate or at least re-examine mandatory minimum sentences long sentences

and the enforcement of drug laws will reinvestigate prison policy improving the conditions of confinement and also reduce the honda families and communities of those incarcerated. finally, to assess the social needs of the committee housing, treatment for mental illness, employment, all of the things that have created so much, and communities and indeed that incarceration has made far worse. i thank you for your attention. [applause] and they give you a quick overview but it is my understanding that i can take questions. this this is a 500 page report. i will put the last slide up it is something you can download with charts issue briefs, all kinds of information that we hope will be of use to you. i am certainly willing to answer questions as well.

>> thank you. how many scholars were formerly incarcerated for directly impacted by the growth of incarceration? two questions. why is structural discrimination in my humble opinion the elephant in the room not listed as the underlying cause of incarceration? >> okay. wonderful question. we had one of the members one of the scholar members was formerly incarcerated. the requirement of the national academies to put together the community was a scholarly requirement. that is to say we had to have various recommendations that we brought from our homework. for example, i am a historian. we had historian. we had sociologists putting the scientists but we very much make sure that in our review of the literature we took the voices concerns and indeed experiences of the formerly incarcerated in incarcerated seriously. one of our key members on the community has done a

tremendous amount of work on solitary confinement. we had a real imperative on this committee to make sure that when we were doing studies they were not just top-down studies that we very much take seriously the voices of the people who were most impacted. the 2nd? am sorry structural discrimination. yes. yes. i invite you to look at chapter four of the report. even though our actual what we came down to actual policy recommendations limited number the report and those recommendations came out of a deeply historical analysis of the root causes. while i highlighted a few i think you'll find that we pay great attention to long-term issues of policing in poverty and so forth. and that would be in chapter four. >> go ahead. >> good morning. thank you.

i ask this question based on the 20 years i spent join the streets of washington dc as a police officer. part of the growth of the incarceration stop licking. the police are the gatekeepers. and so how do you -- what we have seen were baltimore and other places the justice department is supposed to be providing oversight. how do you recommend that we 1st deconstruct the police culture? of the police are the gatekeepers you have to deconstruct that mission before you can change the police. so how do you see the faith community and policymakers coming together to deconstruct the mission of the police. >> it is a wonderful question is. i have to answer it in two ways. as a committee member we did

look at policing come all the police and policing did not end up in our recommendations. by extrapolation our recommendation to change the policies that feed into high rates of incarceration certainly would begin with the immediate implementation of policies on the ground. speaking to you as an individual and myself as a fellow and someone who works on these issues, i do think that the issue of policing is front and center and is very much now linked to issues of incarceration much more so than it was only embarked upon this report command i credit the people of the streets for making that the case. people have spoken people have spoken and make clear that we cannot talk about incarceration without policing. i welcome your comment and certainly as an advocate i support that and think we cannot change that culture that implementation if police officers on the street are expected to continue this low-level policing of drugs and so

forth. great question. okay. i am not allowed to take any more questions. we will move forward to our panel. i'm sorry to todd. >> thank you. [applause] >> good morning. i am a senior fellow here at the center for criminal justice reform. we have been discussing the broken criminal justice system manifested incarceration over criminalization. it is it is a major driver of inequality particularly

racial inequality and poverty here in this country this this all has important civil rights implications but also important human rights implications not the least of which how we achieve the opportunity to have the right to live a life with barriers to basic economic security and human dignity. we are also prepared to answer a few important questions. what obligation in society do we have and what are the consequences for all of us if we fail to restore justice to communities and acknowledge the humanity of our fellow community member? how do we ensure we respectfully and genuinely speak out's and finally what can we do to strike a proper balance between keeping the committee safe are the same time addressing the structural inequities in the criminal justice system. today we today we are proud to welcome distinguished panel will help us sort through these questions. we don't have lot of time.

i invite you to take a look at our website. i will introduce them briefly. president of hope baptist church. several advocacy coordinator at the national wild project. ronald davis director of the oriented policing services and pastor darren ferguson amount baptist church in rockaway new york. ..

>> working on what eventually became reindustry. at that point -- reentry. at that point it was guys getting out of jail. we were doing it out of the back of our cars. a guy would home we'd pick him up at the jail, take him home. eventually getting into ministry and different things we found that a, you know there's a lot of imbalance in terms of what's happening when people get out of prison. so what's happening is in new york state, for example you get out of prison, you get $40 it belongs to you anyway. they give you $40, i don't know if they give you a metro card anymore. and they basically send you home and give you these great things. gain and maintain employment, be home before 9:00 at night and all of this stuff.

and so what happens is you have all of these folks who come home and they feel alienated from society, and they don't feel like there's any place for them. they can't get jobs because they're afraid to go to a job interview, because when they go to a job interview, they're going to ask them that magic question that frightens everybody who's ever been incarcerated have you ever been convicted of a crime. and there's a feeling across the board that there's no place for me there's no hope for me, so what else can i do? and to their credit myself and others have progressed past those points and been able to do things like what i'm doing through organizations like faith in new york who's working on band in a box, through organizations like new york theological seminary, through organizations like healing communities. we've been able to get people to understand that it's not -- i always tell folks who get out of prison it's not your net worth it's your network.

and networking is the way to get past it. so what we've done in new york is working with faith in new york to band a box to get fair hiring practices more people who were formerly incarcerated what we've been doing is working with different reentry organizations to make sure people get the things they need in order to readjust themselves to society in a proper way. and also just being able to be there for people. as a formerly incarcerated person one of the things i can do is talk to people and have those conversations with individuals to help them reintegrate and let them know it's possible. a lot of people don't see the possibilities and that covers a lot of the work we've done so far. >> that's great. thank you very much. and judy, i think this is a good segway to you. we're discussing a lot about mass incarceration overcriminallization. what impact do you think removing barriers for folks with criminal records in employment across the board would have on that conversation? >> you can't talk about criminal justice reform without looking

at what happens once people get out and once they have that record. because as a society we just continue to punish people over and over again. we often don't let them vote, so they can't even have a say in the democratic process through which laws are passed about criminal justice. we erect almost insurmountable barriers to getting employment and reemployment once somebody comes out of incarceration is the single most important factor in preventing recidivism, giving people that sort of opportunity. so we're so pleased to be working with the picot national network many groups in this work that we call the fair chance hiring practices. we've talked about the ban the box movement, to make sure that the question about criminal records can't be asked on initial job application. that it has to happen further along in the process. once somebody already understands that you are a

qualified individual with something to offer that employer. and we find that when people get vested in an applicant and they ask the question later in the process, they're willing to listen to the explanation. they're willing to judge the person on the entirety of their merits much more so than they are if just that little box is checked. and then they go through the individualized assessment that's required by the eeoc guidelines on the use of arrest and conviction records. and they decide whether or not there's a business necessity to refuse to hire somebody. and it's just such an important tool in giving people that chance. so we're very excited that this moment is happening in criminal justice reform and that it is happening in a genuine -- not even bipartisan, if you will sort of an omnipartisan way because people from all walks of life have recognized that what we've done hasn't worked and the ways we continue to punish people long since they've paid their debt to society just offends all notions of justice

and decency and morality. >> thank you. director davis i'm going to switch gears a little bit. we've been talking a lot about the tensions between local law enforcement and communities. can you talk a little bit about what the the president of justice is doing -- the department of justice is doing to try to respond to this and also from your perspective how we strike the proper balance as we've been talking about between public safety and removing crime and violence from our communities and also reforming law enforcement in such a way that we have fair and equitable criminal justice system. >> so first, good afternoon -- good morning, everyone. i don't think you've departed too far from the topic of reentry, because that is a significant part of how we reform the situation is recognizing the impact of system on people across the board. as i look at it, i spent 30 years in law enforcement before i became the director of the cops office, and i watched my evolution as a cop n. 1985 when i became a police officer in oakland, and i remember for

those around in the '80s and '90, we started dealing with the crack epidemic. this is probably where many of our policies started with regards to the war on drugs and mass incarceration. and had you went up to me in 1985 and asked me about reindustry, i would have told you -- reentry, i would have told you i believe in it whole wholeheartedly. clearly, those views are completely wrong. fast forward, i became chief in 2005 of a community in east palo alto. i had really the honor of meeting a formerly incarcerated person who educated me and really touched my soul to the point of saying people deserve second chances, redemption. more importantly, as we started working together, we started seeing the impact of reducing recidivism the impact of police and community relations was strong. i think after 30 years if i could just offer this, we are probably at one of the most defining moments in american policing history that i've seen since i've been in this arena.

and probably in the last 40 or 50 years. we have the opportunity and quite frankly, the obligation to redefine policing in a democratic society. people are talking about a cultural shift. we have to start with what is the role of police in a democratic society. i'm going to borrow a phrase from dr. king on how peace is not just the absence of war, it's the presence of justice. public safety cannot just be the absence of crime it must also include the presence of justice. so we have to change what we want the role to be for policing. so mass incarceration, statistical drops in crime cannot be the priority of public safety or law enforcement. so what the department of justice has for us to really work on this one is my office focuses specifically on community policing. we offer services for police departments to take a look at their operations their assessments to work with the community, to evaluate to provide progress reports. we provide training. we deal with issues of implicit bias which is a huge issue of why people do what they do and

getting to understand the impacts of it. we have the department of justice has a civil rights division which everyone is aware of with pattern of practice investigations most recently the agreement in cleveland. the ferguson report. we have a lot of services. and i think the way we respond to crisis, the way we respond to what's happening in the country is one to provide assistance to communities. i think the attorney general said it best that we cannot federalize local law enforcement, and that's not the intent. there's a reason why we created these 16,000 departments, it was about local control. but we can help set up standards by which the 16,000 agencies should be able to follow. and we should assure that whether it's two officers or 20,000 that they are engaging in constitutional policing and that the impact to the community is the same. we can also provide training and guidance. we can identify best practices and working with the community to insure that we're doing it right way. i also point to in december of last year the president put together the 21st century task force on policing.

and he wanted to, really wanted this task force to identify a couple things, address a couple questions how do we build trust between the communities and the police department and how we do so that we still can assure we have the kind of public safety that we all deserve. and for about three months, four months the group worked, and there's a report out we just released in may that identifies 60 concrete recommendations on how to proceed forward. and what i would strongly recommend as community leaders, civil rights leaders, you know, teachers, community members, law enforcement is to really look at those 60 recommendations. and they range from looking at independent prosecutors to civilian oversight to implicit training to hiring to diversity. those core things that we know would get to the systems that are at play. you know too often in this country we make the debate about good officers and bad officers, and that does come into play. we need to hire right cops to do the job effectively. but as someone said earlier, maybe one of speakers, it's not just about good and bad

officers. we actually have systems that will make sure good officers have bad outcomes despite their best behavior. the system was, in fact, designed to have the outcome which is the disparate incarceration of young men of color. we're still operating in some systems that were used to enforce jim crow leas, policies and practices that exist today. and so a part of this is changing the culture of the organization changing the operational systems questioning how we provide public safety services, questioning how we fight crime. and, you know, making sure you're empowered to ask your department and your cities the right question about what they're engaged in and use that task force report as a report card. are you engaging in these following things, and if not turn to the department of justice and get some assistance or follow the better examples. i'm going to close with this, we have a very unique opportunity to transform police anything this country. i'm watching in my own generation now a new civil rights movement and it's an amazing thing to see, you know?

just a couple weekends ago last weekend my son graduated from high school, and he just got accepted to college. he's going to be going to northwestern. now, i've been a cop for 30 years i was chief for 8 now i have a pretty good title at department of justice but i still have the same fear as every black man here and black mother that when my son goes to this college, what is he going to encounter? what happens when he walks down the street when he goes into chicago? it's not an indictment on law enforcement. i was one for 30 years, it's the most noble profession, and i respect it across the board. but we have a lot of things to fix, and we -- this is the time to do it. so i would really say that we really need to push forward to to find ways to to wring the community together -- to the bring the community together, make the civil rights movement not against the police, but with the police. i'm seeing chiefs walking on demonstration lines, i'm seeing police departments starting to recognize and i'm hearing police unions recognizing that we need to improve the relationships. so i would just ask that we come together that we basically not make it a -- [inaudible] it's easy to point blame, but

can we get in that circle of change together and really advance public safety for this country that it doesn't make a difference what color my son is, that the only thing i should be worried about when he goes to college is his grades and whether or not he wants to bring me a grandchild too soon. [laughter] >> wow. ms. garza, i'd like to pick up on something director davis referred to, the democratization of justice. can we talk a little bit about how we can do a better job incorporating the voices of most impacted voices of community members genuinely into this debate? how can we -- what do you suggest we do to make that happen? >> absolutely. so i think the first thing that's really important is to answer this question that mr. davis put forward which is what is the purpose and intent of policing. and, you know, from one perspective you could say that the purpose and intent of policing is to solve problems,

right? and from another perspective you could say that the purpose and intent of policing is to, is to incarcerate people, right? to criminalize, to strip people of their rights and also to punish. and i think what we're seeing right now is a movement that's trying to push more towards the question of how do we solve problems and are police mess for that. necessary for that. that's an honest question. i think the other thing that's really important is to understand that to deal with the question of criminalization we also have to deal with all of the issues that lead to it. is so someone earlier said that you know, poverty is inextricably connected to this question of criminalization. and so if we're going to address that, then we need to put the most impacted voices of folks who are in poverty who are searching for jobs, who are without food, who are being criminalized more being poor -- >> uh-huh. >> -- right? at the center of the conversation.

and part a of that is by having those folks shape what the policies, practices and systems should look like because nobody knows better how to shift the trend of criminalization than those who were been criminalized. the final thing that i'll just put in the center of the table is not only do we need to center those voices, but we need to put folks who have been directly impacted by the system that we're facing in positions of power. so it's not enough to have task forces it's not enough to have a person who can speak to these issues. folks actually need to be able to make decisions that impact our lives. and until we're able to do that, we're not going to see a lot of the shifts that we desire and that's why in the opening remarks we heard right that it doesn't actually matter what the face looks like if the agenda's the same. so let's make sure that the people who want to move a more progressive agenda are in a position to be able to make those decisions.

>> thank you very much. reverend brown given your work in north baltimore, i want to talk to you a little bit about or ask you um, you know, ms. garza referred to how we can sort of get the voices of the most impacted into the conversation. what issues are you seeing on the ground in your work that aren't being translated into effective policy either at state level or at the federal level to reform our criminal justice system? >> well, i think -- and thanks again for the invitation. i think alicia hit it on the head when she talked about and referenced the power arrangement and who actually is determining where our resources go. i think that we have to really just sit -- [inaudible] as my jesuit brothers and sisters would say, we've got to lean into that discomfort and look at the ways in which the power brokers and stakeholders are often times those who are not directly affected by the

institutional racism that is manifested in local communities. right? and so i'm having is a déjà vu moment a little bit. i'm not an old guy but i've studied history a little bit. and after the watts uprising in the '60s, some of these same kinds of settings happened, and the same kind of report was produced that spoke to some of the same issues -- and i look forward to reading your report. it's 500 page, i will get to it at some point -- but some of the same issues were address t in the '60s. when harlem went up, some of the same reports some of the same recommendations happened in harlem as well. so when we talk about what do we need and how do we bring them into the conversation, i would say, number one the conversations are already happening, they're just not happening here. they're happening in the local commitments and the barbershops beauty salons and local communities where people are providing expert analysis on not only the problem, but also the solutions, and i have a hunch -- i don't know if this is true or

not -- but i have a hunch that the solutions that people are coming forth with in, like, gilmore homes in west baltimore and east baltimore are the kinds of solutions that make us uncomfortable because it may mean us moving out of spaces of privilege and rendering space to others who can speak best and move the most on these issues. and so what does that look like in baltimore? in baltimore right now what that looks like is not only the legislative work we're doing as part of a wonderful organization called baltimore united for change, it's a group of social justice organizations with a long and strong track record of working on these issues from the legislative advocacy to op-eds and writing and everything else. community organizing, etc. but in addition to banging on the system as i'm terming it right now, in addition to banging on the system in terms of going to annapolis and getting legislation passed and etc., we also have to build some power. and that is the piece that i don't -- as i study history, i don't see that piece put forward as strongly right? and so with the report and

commission that came out after watts, it was what can we do for them. and the report and commission that came after harlem, what can we do for them, right? and so it's this assumption that at the base of it if we just provide more, then they'll calm down, right? and i think also on the other side of that i think is people who are directly affected by these issues of institutional racism and the like also have a tendency sometimes to recline and say, okay, now that the uprising is done, let's wait for the experts to come in and fix it right? i think we have to remember why, why did i even get invited to the center for american progress in the first place? it's because young people in baltimore said enough is enough and all of the avenues that you have set up to to deal with the issues that plague us are not working, and so we're going to do things our way. and then i get an invite to a wonderful panel. [laughter] right? or alicia gets an invite -- speaking at wonderful conferences, right? so i think remembering what got

us here, right, how do we continue to organize the build for power in such a way that continues to have us at tables of negotiation and not at the kiddie table n. my family, i've got country roots in my family. my dad's side is from north carolina, my mama's side from virginia and in our family coming up when we had big family gatherings, there was the adult table and the kiddie table, and i was so excited when i graduated from the kiddie table to the adult table. at the kiddie table, you had no right to say anything about what the adults were speaking about, right? and so we looked over there, but if we even acted like we heard 'em, they would -- move over, mind your business or whatever. and so we graduated to the adult table. why am i saying that? i'm saying that because i believe that organizing on the ground in baltimore and oakland, new york, and what have you that it's time to turn over the kiddie table right?

and go to the adult table move the adults away, this is the agenda we need to set up. baltimore looks like us feeding ourselves. one in four people in baltimore live in a food desert. and until we in the midst of the uprising said, you know what? we need to start doing some of this stuff on our own because we can't wait for the benebraska lens of others no -- benevolence or others to come and save us in the midst of our trauma. so we started feeding ourselves and creating a food system that connected churches with farmers with colleges and universities and i personally was driving -- alicia was on my church bus -- i personally was driving food around the city along with our partners and our colleagues and feeding ourselves. and at the pennsylvania and north avenue, and i'm a pastor too, like pastor mike, and so i feel -- i need to shut down in a

minute, i feel my third point coming. [laughter] very quickly, i'll just say what we saw was we started to create the systems that we needed. and so near the pennsylvania and north avenue, i was watching on cnn and whatever else, the corner stores were affected to the degree that entire neighborhoods were starving because those corner stores were affected, right? and that's criminal even before all that went could down. it's criminal that entire neighborhoods are relying on corner stores to eat, right? and so midst of the uprising that picture crystallized and it was urgent for us to move forward on feeding ourselves. not only that, but also on canvassing our own communities, right? so we're not calling 911 for everything. let us move into spaces where we develop the training, skills necessary and just be neighbors and sisters and brothers again so that we can help to engage some of the issues that might lead to interpersonal violence so that we don't even have to call 911 for everything. and so you saw bloods and crips

and black guerrilla family and preachers and imams sisters and brothers marching together through the streets, just checking in on family members. you okay? even in the midst of the curfew, we're checking with each other. basically in a nutshell, in addition to banging on the system, in addition to going to the white house and moving forward on legislation to ban the box etc., etc. i think it is a mistake for those who are post directly affected by these issues to recline and wait for others to do it. we have to continue to build for power economically, socially and politically so that we can get to that adult table and say no more will we rely on the benevolence of a system that has an appetite for our destruction to decide our destiny. no more. [applause] >> tell 'em how you really feel. >> sorry. >> don't make me follow that. [laughter] >> i won't. we're all going to follow this one. in talking to a number of you about this panel we talked a

little bit about this bipartisan moment that we're all observing or experiencing, and i want to ask each one of you to answer this question. what if any opportunities do you see for solving the problems you all identified? getting off getting to the adult table, pushing through in communities to take care of the predicates to entering the criminal justice system, resolving implicit bias, getting to issues of reducing barriers to folks who have records? what opportunities do you see to resoing all of those issues and more many this bipartisan moment in the state level, at the federal level. i'll start with ms. garza. >> well, firstly incarceration is incredibly expensive and one thing that i think democrats and republicans can agree on is that it's an incredible waste of money. and certainly not an effective use of resources given all of the things that we are trying to make sure has resources and funding.

so that seems like an opportunity to me. i have to be honest though, when we talk about the bipartisan moment, we have to be very conscious of the fact that a incarceration is also an industry and a business. >> yes. yes. >> and so until we remove the profit motive from putting people in cages and keeping them there for years and years and years and years and then having them under state surveillance for years and years and years, we're not going to make much progress even in a bipartisan moment. so that's something i think we need to be paying attention to moving forward. but again, i do think this question of how do we more effectively use our resources to promote the social good as opposed to continue to further social ills is a wonderful opportunity. >> i, you know, in terms of the postconviction barriers that we see, you know, we're seeing red states and governors in red

states passing laws issuing executive orders. and, alicia is right, a lot of it is from this notion that this doesn't make economic sense what we're doing. you know, when i'm in rooms in d.c., there are people from sort of all spectrums that are there because either it costs too much it offends their religious sensibilities, they're worried about the civil rights implications, you know, from sort of all spectrums of the political sphere. and they're coming together at this moment and understanding that we've got to give people a second chance. and what i think is so important about that is what the reverend was talking about. that in and of itself is something that can put formerly incarcerated people right at the center of the solution. because once that first person gets a second chance in an employer situation and people know their story and they understand that this person has made a mistake, has accepted responsibility and has changed their lives or, quite frankly

they learned that maybe they didn't make a mistake that the white kid two neighborhoods down didn't make as well. but they didn't get the chance that that kid -- who looked like i did as a teenager -- got. and that will start to be a way to open up the conversation about the racial systems that we have in this country that give some people a chance and other people not a chance. and about the never ending human capacity for redemption and to turn one's life around when that's needed. and i think that's one of the most tremendous tools. so is we come at it with these public policy levers, but what's really going to make a difference is when people get that chance and other people have their eyes open and their hearts opened. and they understand that things aren't black and white simple answers yes or no, right and wrong. and that there's a lot of complexity to it. so for me, one of the things that's most exciting about this moment is the opportunity for people to really learn from

other people who have gone through the system, about just how unfair and unjust it is no matter how it is that you got there. >> wow. i think a lot of the roots of this is in something i will call us versus them. the us versus them is that there are -- we're talking about closing prisons right? there's an economic engine that is driven by prisons in different communities, especially in upstate new york where i'm from. so they want to take away jobs from us by closing our prisons, and we can't let them do that. inside the prisons there's this tension between us and them. they want to keep us locked up, so they are enemy. and in our churches they don't want to hear what thus sayeth the lord, so they are the enemy, or they don't go to church, so they are the enemy or they don't open a bible they open a

quran, so they are the enemy. they wear blue uniforms and carry guns, and they are on our streets, and they want to victimize us. and they are on streets, so they're committing crimes, and they are a danger to us because we may not go home at the end of the day because something one of them does to us. and we have to, some of us have to live on this dangerous precipice of being us and them at the same time. i'm us and them at the same time. i'm us because i progressed to the point where i have a nice job, and i live pretty comfortably. me and my wife make a nice living. and i look at some of them on the corners and they are an affront to me because they are where i used to be, but they don't see that they can be where i am. and, and i live on the precipice of us versus them because even though i spent nine years of my life in new york state prisons, my father was a cop for 25 years in new york city.

so i went to a place where they put us, and us lived in my house us was my dad. they were my dad. so we have to start to transcend this difference between the kid table and the adult table and know that the kids have to have a voice because how can the adults properly raise children be they don't know what the children need? and how can the children properly relate to the adults if they don't understand the adults' point? and we have to stop thinking that people are taking things away from us and realize that it's not an us versus them because if we really looked in the mirror, if we really dig deep, if we really look within ourselves, we realize that when we look at them, they are us, and we are them. and the only way to solve this is to come together at the table of brotherhood. cops aren't my enemy. cops aren't my enemy because even though i feel nervous and some kind of way when i get pulled over because i drive a nice car in the hood, i still

want them because i want them to protect me. and even though that muslim over there has been vilified and demonized by the media as being somebody that's against american values, they are still us because i have muslim brothers and sisters who want their children to go to school just like i do. and correction officers who want their children to go to school just like i do, because there's correction officers' children who go to school with my children. at the end of it, we're all in this big melting pot that means if we don't start doing something for ourselves we're all doomed. and we have to stop looking at it as who's trying to take things away and realize that all of us have something to offer, wring everybody to the -- bring everybody to the table and let everybody have a voice. because at the end of the day, i don't care if you're democratic, republican, white, black young, old, southern, northern, we all want the same things. we all want good school we want an opportunity for prosperity an opportunity to live better lives, an opportunity for our children to be educated and be safe going to and from wherever

they go. we don't want to have to monitor our children at 15 years oold because we're afraid they're going to be shot by somebody who looks like them or because they're afraid of what they've seen in the streets and they don't know us. we have to sit down at the table of brotherhood. we have to shake hands. we have to hug one another. we have to have uncomfortable conversations. we have to make one another mad. we have to walk away and agree to disagree and not walking away saying i don't want anything to do with them. i may not be comfortable with it but i have to understand everybody. if we're going to truly, truly understand that the american values are saying everybody, all men are -- and women -- are created equal. and we have to stop that narrative of saying all men are created equal because all men all women all children all black, all white, all christian all muslim all formerly incarcerated gay straight, lesbian, we're all god's children, and we all have a place at the table, and we have to fight for one another. if you don't fight for me, then we all lose.

[applause] >> one of my professors in seminary dr. jerome ross he said i'm a believer and a realist, the two will not the same. two are not the same. he would often say that. he would push us as preachers to stand and lean into the vision of what we can but not so much that you lose sight of where you are. and i'm so thankful for how the reverend just put forward -- i thought i was preaching. we were in a tent revival for a moment. [laughter] how he helped to point us to a vision of where we can be in light of where we are. i would just add that what sister alicia has shared, i think, is particularly important as it relates to the realities of the bible called spiritual wickedness in high places. we had 17 bills in the last maryland general assembly.

earlier this year. 17 bills dealing with police accountability and transparency. and my brother love, another member of the coalition, awesome, awesome brother, we're working going to annapolis from baltimore back and forth over this 09-day period. 90-day period. and as we were building a statewide coalition to get something done, we learned pretty early on that these bills were not moving. in a very candid conversation with one of the leaders of the legislative black caucus in maryland, i said, delegate, we come down here every other day, we've got to feed these people we're bringing folks from baltimore every other day why can't we get anything done on this legislation? and she said very frankly she said to me, reverend brown, she said the police union puts money in all of our campaigns. >> uh-huh. >> she said, and we can't pass anything if they don't like it. >> well -- >> the same thing came back to the fore when not long ago

governor larry hogan vetoed legislation that would have enfranchised 40,000 people in baltimore alone with right to vote. in the article where they wrote about his rationale for vetoing that legislation, it said that the police union was not in agreement with giving people the right to vote after they have served their time. and can i just be a little bit weird giving people a second chance? i think if we flip that on its head perhaps it's the people giving the system another chance. perhaps. because when you think about people before they -- black people before they're even born, before they're even born having to face hurdles, societal and political hurdles before i even come through the birth canal. we can look at how the tables are stacked in such a way that before i even get here you're running before i can have my birthday. and so i think that when you look at the profit motive that you raised, very important point

which is why i go back to building for power in local communities. i am thankful for those who are doing the work at the federal level and trying to move things forward there. but i, again, remember watts. major legislation passed shortly before watts went up. and people -- why, we just gave the right to vote, this, that and the other, and why are people still upset? i think a part of that may be because it just takes so long before my day-to-day reality is impacted by something that whoever's in the white house signs. and then too when you look at the democratic and republican in maryland, yes, we have a republican governor right now. but as pastor to mike said earlier, you know, we are a democratic legislature. maryland's supposed to be a progressive state legislatively, politically etc. nothing moved. so i think the opportunity is for local communities to continue to build for power,

continue to examine questions like what is the role of police and what do we need to feel safe. and then with this question of how can we improve relationships between the police and the community, stop killing black people. [laughter] stop killing brown people. >> please. >> stop killing trans. let's start there. before we go to how are we going to hold hands and walk into the sunset can you stop killing us? let's just start there. on the ground in baltimore, it's really not that complicated. >> thank you. >> stop shooting me. >> thank you. >> we really can just -- we can shut down the whole conversation, send back to the bar. stop killing black people, brown people. stop killing, marginalizing oppressing people. let's start right there and continue. if the onus is always on the community to show up with good natured, good hearts to extend a hand and a peace branch, i think you're wrong. i think repentance is due for

the system that helped to put us in this position right now. it is the police, the it is the system of policing that must repent and let's go from there after we get that done. >> hallelujah. >> uh-huh. >> thank you. >> two things. i'm going to start where the pastor to left off at, and i think we have to be careful -- not to say that he's wrong, but to have -- i think it would be oversimplistic to simply say stop, right? because if everything stopped today, a lot of the systems we have still involve mass incarceration, bad relationships, and i agree with you about one thing. one of the things we're learning is what happened in some agencies and not all of them is to get reconciliation, the acknowledgment of the role the police have played in oppressing communities of color. so i think there has to be a starting point, i agree with you. the starting point has to be the acknowledgment, in some cases even the apology that it was the police that enforced jim crow's law, the war on crime that resulted in disparate outcomes, the police that have disparities in everything from incarceration to even the use of deadly force.

we acknowledge it. it's our policies. even though they're well intended, they have resulted in deteriorating literally, thousands of neighborhoods across this country. then i think we can sit down and have the conversation. i do agree with you, it is hard to talk to somebody you feel is still violating you at the moment they're talking to you. so we have to balance that. i would say with this bipartisan moment, i would really encourage -- especially the empowerment of local leaders, and i agree with having people at the table that have the power. and i would say the best way to have the power is to understand the system so that you can change the right part of the system. and so this is a bipartisan moment. we see that there is a lot of support for issues of sentencing reform because as was just said, it's very expensive to keep people in prison. that's not the only part of the system in which you would want bipartisanship. just shutting down a system is insufficient. some states are doing justice reinvestment. it's reinvesting billions that we're using in incarceration

back into the very community so that they can empower themselves and deal with the true culprit of crime and disorder in our communities which is poverty lack of education, opportunities and a lack of hope, jobs, things of that nature. that money should be reinvested. we have a federal reentry sewer agency group -- interagency group that the administration has started, and they identified something like 30,000, 40,000 barriers to people coming out of prison. just things you would never imagine. when i started the reentry program in california i learned something that was amazing to me that i didn't know know as a policymaker, and that was a person coming up to me and saying at the time chief this guy owes child support so when he gets out of prison, he consistent get an id charge. -- didn't get an id card. he was doomed to come back before he even walked out the gate. it was designed to do that. he can't get housing because

he's formerly incarcerated. if we're going to inform the system, make sure it can't just be an censoring, which is the tip of the iceberg it has to be about the -- i agree with you you don't want to federalize the police in d.c. in fact, the motto i put in my office right now, our job is to help fill advancement field. the answer to the questions we're looking for are in some communities, either an 18-year-old who lives out there all day how do you create the venn -- venue for them to succeed? that is the challenge i think local leaders like here at table have to grapple with to get there. but i just want to make sure we don't overcelebrate that. we want bipartisanship, it is occurring. i think we should embrace this moment, but it can't just be one aspect of the system. it to has to be that system of mass incarceration and not similarly

a lot of arrests. it's the back end and it's everything in between that you would want bipartisanship to support it. >> thank you direct canner davis. -- director davis. i want to let you answer this sort of last question. you touched on the recommendations. there's 60 recommendations. that's a lot. where are our local police officers, local police departments supposed to begin in terms of taking next steps to follow the recommendations of your task force? >> so what the pastor said one is to actually recognize that the recommendations exist and to take the time to read the report and to understand that these are recommendations. and not recommendations of what we can do for you because it's not -- these are recommendations for the local law enforcement communities to do themselves. i think the second part is to acknowledge that there is a dramatic need for change. that there has, something has to change and to understand why there is so much unrest and why people are so upset with the police. the third part, and i think this is the critical part is the

acknowledgment of why we're standing here right now and that the demonstrations are not just people who want to defy the law it is an expression of people's frustration from being disenfranchised and being oppressed for many generations. the generational mistrust is exploding. once the agencies understand that then the idea would be to then sit down with the community. some of the recommendations we have i think, the task force was brilliant at shifting it that we didn't say here's what you should do, because once again that's an edict and we're basically telling communities a what to do. for example civilian oversight. they recommended that the core principles of civilian oversight should be there that this checks and balance requires that. it still requires local leaders community members and local government to decide what's the best venue, format and structure for you and it's not a one size fit all. otherwise you are preaching from d.c. so i would really think the police departments should, one, read it, should do an evaluation to see what recommendations

they're implementing, which ones they're not. the community should do the same thing and they should sit down together and figure out which ones are applicable to their community and implementing it. we're putting grants out there to incentivize it, to support it additional research to identify those best practices, and i think -- and we're going to keep trying to help at the federal level, but the keyword is help because i agree with everyone here it has to be, you know some of these issues have to be dealt with at the local level. >> thank you very much, and thank you to all the panelists. we're going to open it up for questions. by the way, ms. garza has to make a flight back to, back home. so thank her. [applause] pastor mike's going to join our panel for the q&a. go right ahead. >> my question is this, you can't get locking two million people up and it not be

bipartisan. so you all are saying this is a bipartisan moment right now. white supremacy and racism is bipartisan. so to term it as this is a special moment for my freedom when my being locked up is not that? and by the way i'm the person that helped coin the term ban the box. so at a certain point when we talk about banning the box, for the most part unless we change it to fair chance and allow other people to move it forward we won't even get credit for our own voice. it will be taken over and usurped by educated people that doesn't necessarily mean that it will empower anybody. so when y'all talk about ban the box and you don't attribute it to a body of people that actually been fighting for other other -- for over a decade to get equal rights then you're actually doing us a disservice, because it will disempower us. >> i agree. if i could just respond to that quickly. and a lot of the work we've done around ban the box new york even with the city council and the

picot network, one of my critiques of this is that ban the box is a nice gesture that starts a conversation and needs to go further. it's not a be all end all because there's ways around ban the box. and in most legislations that i've read there's not enough teeth to really punish employers more not following the mandate. so it's really just the beginning, it's one of those symbolic victories that we need to fight for, that we need to continue to fight for which starts a larger conversation which reverberates into further policy change into exactly what you're talking about. >> if i could ad one thing to that, i think to dorsey's point, and i think this is probably our responsibility. i keep this one at the federal level, is i watched him when i was in east palo alto, basically, knock on a thousand doors hit the street, all of us do the work to come up with that and start with whether it was oakland or berkeley city by city, going to council meetings and doing it. and it goes to what the previous panel's talked about about the movement and local people making

things happen. that does start to dissipate as it starts rising and starts getting to people with big titles. if we keep our eye on the ball that this movement i still say this bipartisan moment because there are policies on all sides of the aisle that have contributed to the incarceration of especially the disparate impact but it's going to take that same bipartisan movement to end it. i think we keep our eye on the ball that it's usually those that are engaged in the battle those that, as someone said, are the receiving end of the service, the lack thereof or even to presentation that has some of the oppression. and you're right, as we get fancy titles and all the things that go with it, we sit at the white house and things like that, we have to remember where this stuff comes from, who was the creator of it. so i think that's a very good reminder for us as we go about our days and our meetings not to forget where this is coming from quite frankly.

>> thank you. i'm jackie zimmerman, i'm at the department of education but i'm not here representing the department, i'm here for my own learning. mr. davis, i have a question for you. more your -- regarding the recommendations to police departments around country, what if their response is something like, hell no? for example, and i'm asking about consequences. for example the southern poverty law center has uncovered in florida that because of the zero tolerance policy in schools if a child, for example, forgets his or her belt on their uniform, they get taken out of school they get put in adult prisons, three hours a day solitary confine lt. the parents lose, they become a ward -- the child becomes a ward of the state and parents lose the right to their child.

what are the consequences for that from the federal level or any level? >> so the consequences of not implementing the recommendations at the federal level, there are none. the consequences for violating the constitution could lead to activities we've seen in things like cleveland, ferguson. but those are extreme levels. we're not going to litigate our way to police reform. what i would ask is those recommendations, a lot of the lessons learned goes back to what people are saying. the gone intentions for not doing -- consequences for not doing good policing, the greatest consequence is the community. not me in d.c. they should be worried about the empowering community that tells that mayor that you're not engaged in effective policing, community policing, and so we get to hold you accountable through the elect tomorrow process, through -- electoral process, through accountability. because, you know, the system is policing is local. but although policing is local public safety's national. so we do have a role in helping

and guiding and providing best practices. but to be very candid, the role of holding people accountable for the implementation of that is limited and i don't want to missell it. we can incentivize, we can encourage, we can lift up great examples of best practices, but if the chief says, man i'm not doing that nonsense, they can do what, the person holding that chief accountable has got to be that local community that is empowered to say, hold it, i know this is better practice because i've talked to experts on the ground doing it why aren't you doing this is, i think the greatest accountability. outside of that we have to wait to where there's violations but then it means just victims and you now have powder kegs potentially all over the country just waiting for a single incident to ignite because people are that frustrated. >> this speaks to reverend brown's point of why we have to build our own power. to hold systems accountable. because the truth of the matter

is, you know people will go as far as you allow them to go. we have to make it so consequential for them to be able to pull that kind of stuff off, this is why the young people in ferguson in baltimore, in new york oakland all across the country why we pour out into the streets why we pour out into the highways. we want to make it so uncomfortable for people to do business as usual until you are willing to change your practice. and it's an appeal also to our my loon throe by -- philanthropy and other wealthy folks that we need you all to help resource the building of power in communities to be able to counteract the power apparatus as it presently exists. that is always well funded. always well entrenched always very -- [inaudible] be able to build very powerful

response that makes sure that if we can't get the accountability from the federal government, then the people will bring accountability in a way that is undeniable, and that, i think has to be a part of our work, organizing the power to actually bring accountability to the local level. >> my name is -- [inaudible] i'm from youngstown, ohio. my question is within all of this that we have going on with mass incarceration, no one has mentioned profiteering aspect and what we need to do with those corporations. corporations don't die. they're like vampires, like they don't -- they just don't die. and another thing we -- so with the collateral sanctions, we have collateral sanctions in place in every state with the department of corrections that give employers guidelines to hiring. say, for instance i came home, i've been home 22 years, and my

charges says that i can work as a social worker. i have my degrees i have several trees. i got educated but i can't use those degrees. that's crazy. but how are we going to reinforce these laws and these policies that we with the power now that we know that we have power, how are we going to enforce those laws? we need something else to guarantee the stability that we build for ourselves. >> [inaudible] >> look, you know i'm a lawyer by training i can help guide legislatures in how to draft the best ban the box law possible, remove barriers but there's only so far that's going to go because as people have said there's ways employers find to get around everything all the time. and i'm not going to sit up here and be pollyanna and tell you differently. i think it gets back to the underlying point about building power to where it is so intolerable that people just demand justice and won't put up with it anymore. but, you know to sort of get

into another area that i know cap is very big on, campaign finance reform has to be part of this as well. because if the prison complex industry can keep pumping money into campaign after campaign after campaign for people that are running on all sides of the tickets, there's a tremendous motive there to listen to that money that goes into the coffers as opposed to the people who are demonstrates in the streets. -- demonstrating in the streets. so we have to be honest about what the supreme court has done to our country as a whole on all of the kind of issues that we care about in terms of the power that the wealthy corporations and the wealthy in general have to really dictate how easy it is for our elected officials to vote against the overwhelming interests of their constituents. >> and when you when you have power -- what's your name again? akim? and i appreciate your vampire comment. [laughter] because because dracula has shown up in baltimore too. [laughter] when mr. martin o'malley was the

governor of the state, he was promoting and pushing a $104 million youth jail. and our coalition, our groups were fighting against that, and we were ultimately successful in shutting that down. now we have a republican governor who has breathed new life into the same plan with lower price tag. now he wants to renovate and build a $30 million youth jail, so here we are having déjà vu all over again. one democratic governor, now republican governor. we know in our community it don't matter, right? but here's what matters, at least in the minds of some, the baltimore sun reported so far during the baltimore uprising that the city has lost $20 million. and it was only after that happened that the business class, nonprofits nonprofit industrial complex and the like, they got a higher consciousness when they had a lower bottom line right? and so building for power in addition to creating alternative food systems also means looking at other ways so that when we

get to -- when we build our own table or go visit other people's tables, we can negotiate from a position of strength as opposed to saying can you please do for me. so in baltimore, april 5 2016, is the next democratic primary election right? so we're organizing now so that when that democratic primary election happens in less than about 11 months now we'll be able to effectuate our desires from the local communities, because we've built up our own capacity and not depending on think tanks and other groups to do for us. we can do for ourselves. we've got thing. >> and the research is important. if we know there are corporations out here who are the draculas, maybe we need to start a dracula campaign. we need to expose them. >> yeah. >> make them make them public. because many of this under the cover of night most folk don't know that a lot of our fortune 500 corporations are actually profiting off of private prison labor and other forms of

legalized slavery, quote-unquote, right? >> yeah. >> and i think we can shame them publicly in a way that will at least create some kind of public accountability, and we need to do the same thing with our elected officials. in the state of california, our governor, jerry brown was -- has taken lots of money from the private industry, private prison industry and we had to make that known. and we believe that just because you claim to be a ally of our communities don't mean you get a free pass. if you're engaging in activity that is counter in some of our young folks say revolutionary dare i say immoral or just plain wrong, then we have the responsibility to make it known. and then if they want to continue in the behavior then we all then have another opportunity to hold them accountable through our voting through where we shop, through who we support, etc., etc. etc.

>> we have time for one more question. >> all right. good morning. my name is tonya ward jordan i'm the president and founder of the coalition for change, we represent federal employees, present and former, who are dealing with race discrimination and retaliation in federal government. and my question is to mr. davis with the department of justice. you know when ferguson happened and michael brown was killed and when baltimore happened and freddie gray was killed, everybody was looking for department of justice to intercede. my question is given the climate of retaliation within the department of justice where the u.s. marshals black marshals have filed in civil court class action and they're pending another one at the eeoc, anyone can bag to cl it, he had a 25-year-long lawsuit against the u.s. marshal service after he whistle blowed and told how they were targeting black neighborhoods. my question is what is doj doing

to change the culture internally for those persons who speak out against injustice, who are trying to safeguard the public like those persons in ferguson and etc. that is the question and i also would submit to you that you support congressman ely ya cummings' bill on the hill, 1557, which is you talked about accountability and transparency. that's what we need to safeguard civil servants who speak out and say there's a problem here. >> i'm going to let director davis respond. >> yeah, i mean, other than -- i'm sorry, your name again? tonya, i mean, you're familiar with the department's policies on whistle blowing and actually whether the inspector general or -- there's a lot of options for people to deal with issues of retaliation against whiting blowers, so -- whistleblowers so i'm not in a position to speak to quite frankly, the u.s. marshals' service or the lawsuits filed so i'm at a

disadvantage other than as a principal, a component. i know the it is our continue wall conversation at the justice department to insure that federal employees are protected, that they're respected, that their voice is heard, that you have to protect the whistle blowing because this is how you identify corruption, inefficiencies ineffectiveness. so i think what i would say more so than regurgitate policies to you is just to really reinforce and encourage employees to take advantage of all those protections in a venue they have in reporting. and there's a lot of options there. but i'm just really disadvantaged about a specific case in the marshals' service. i can give you my card later and if there's a follow-up i can do for you i will. but i'm at a disadvantage to answer 5:00 the marshals' service here. >> i'm going to have to bring this to a close. i want to thank our panel, and ms. garza who had to leave, for this very stimulating conversation. it was fantastic. and thank you all for coming. [applause]

[inaudible conversations] >> coming up on booktv in prime time books about waging war. next diana preston and her book, "a higher form of killing: six weeks in world war i that forever changed the nature of warfare." then andrew coburn and his book about the history of drone warfare "kill chain." and authors gabriela blum and benjamin wittes discuss future of violence about what happens when civilians gain access to advanced military technology. ..