2008. i think that is a functional as a practical matter complete adherence seems impractical and unwise given the position of the united states today as the world's largest military power and economic power. the u.s. has national interest in almost every corner of the globe -- and more weapons than any other world power. i sheer variety of possible military conflicts for the u.s. of military force for combatting terrorists and shooting pirates to prevent the could tras toe fees and other powers seems to support the idea that the strict congressionalist view is not practical. even with we abandon the view, there's still much room for debate over the exact scope of the president's independent powers.

and the obama administration has given itself a substantive limit by saying although the president can use military force without congress, that force cannot announce what's been war. what a war versus use of military force is a very fuzzy definition. the bombing in libya was determined not to be a military force. not enough to war. without giving the president unchecked power to engage in military force. the president can act independently without congress up until it engages in a war -- there's a variety of other problems in that including the international definition of war means essentially that would be every action almost no declared wars anymore.

that's one way in which the administration has tried to do the power it claimed for itself. i think the disagreements as to what constitutes a war, i think that there has been evolution in the obama administration towards a view of how war powers are allocated in the constitution. even the current debate over isis, it sought congressional authorization while expressly pointed out it doesn't need it and adopted a very difficult and difficult to support interpretation of the 2001 authorization for use of military force. even without that, much more -- conception of the president's role in -- independent role in

deciding when and how to initiate military conflict on behalf of the united states. so i believe that the conversion from barack obama from a strict congressionalist to presidentialist is a welcome and even understandable development i do hope the candidates recognize this. some statements perhaps may not demonstrate full understanding of the issues we're facing but hope they recognize the weakness of the view before they wholeheartedly embrace it. thanks. >> thank the three of you for those illuminating comments. i'll invoke my moderator prerogative to start the questioning off with the first one and hear from members of the audience. so i think we'll jump off from the professor who's presentation and distinction between

congressional and presidential war powers and both as a legal matter and practical matter is argument that the case for presidential war power. so i want to give both the senator a chance to respond to that and i'll frame the question this way. so professor, you talked about clear objectives and flexibility as the key principles operationally which could be although not necessarily would be, might be in conflict with one another, right? i wonder whether for you whether the model presidential war powers over congressional war powers is more amenable or would be easier to carry out though as we're balanced to clear objectives in flexibilities as

opposed to the congressional model. easier to have two things that the military wants if they follow the presidential as opposed to congressional model. and professor goodman, you have an incredibly rich discussion of the current debate around the aumf, the new authorization for isil specific aumf. and i wondered whether -- does this debate support or in your view the professor's version, which as i read it, that the congressional approval is perhaps salutary and beneficial for various reasons but not required and that being born out by the context of both of the last 14 years and also the current debate.

>> so i certainly think that the actions of the military, the culture of the military, what the military is seeking probably enables the evolution of power for the president. so if you only have one boss, it's much easier to respond to one boss than two bosses where the second boss is 535 people. certainly over our history, what typically the military seeks as far as guidance and what it needs to do. i certainly believe it enables or supports the idea of enhanced presidential power. if the president is limited then it limits the military. if the president has more flexibility back on its own than the military by virtue has more power to act on its own. >> so i will dive into that as well and suggest maybe the military might benefit from shared powers in the sense that one of the items that's lacking from the white house draft authorization use of force against isil is the objective.

one of the questions that's been raised and senator corker raised it, what is the objective so we can know and measure whether or not we're succeeding and i think that's something that the congress can force the administration to give to the public in a certain sense of what really is the objective and why do you want authorization to use force against isil, is success pushing isil back over the border so it's con strained inside syria, december mating or defeating it to the point it no longer pose a threat to iraq or any threat to the united states? what's the objective? and currently we don't have that under presidential when congress isn't involved and congress maybe has the appropriations in the background to try to force that. on the second question with

respect to does the authorization to use force suggest something about the notion that the president can actually act without it, i don't think so because i don't think the administration is as julian put it -- julian said they are not uncomfortable with their isil arguments because they've got article two in the background. i think they are uncomfortable and if they aren't, they should be. the kinds of questioning that secretary kerry has had to undergo in the senate foreign relations committee makes him uncomfortable, it's not such a great legal argument. i think why they resorted to this kind of statutory authority, not that they say we don't need this from you because of article, 2, because you had already give it to us in 2001. the president has unapologetically embraced imperialism, he made bad args. s to force the argument it's operating under congressional authority. so some of the argument with respect to the war powers resolution in libya was because

this administration has in fact embraced the war powers resolution more than other administrations and said but we need the war powers resolution because it doesn't rise to the level of hostilities and the like which are stretches of legal arguments but he's not unapoll gettically embracing a presidential model but trying to figure within congressional statute. same thing with the bergdahl exchange. it was almost like a constitutional avoidance question interpreting congress's restrictions on moving people out of guantanamo to be consistent with presidential powers so that more like a statutory interpretation. once again, wrapped themselves up in the act they are acting within congressional authority. last one so we have at least on the table counter evidence, i

think listed out a lot of points in favor but counter evidence, march 2009 in litigation for habeas claims out of guantanamo, the federal judge required the administration to give the legal rationale. i don't think they were comfortable at the time and in a brief march 13th, 2009, was an important moment in which the president said i'm not claiming article 2 commander in chief authority. only claiming i'm operating under the 2001 amf which is a remarkable move by a president to not claim more power and claim less. think there's that kind of counter current we have to take into account if we have an interpretation of what the administration has done. it's not been in one direction but more mixed. >> before we turn it over to the audience, give you an opportunity to respond. >> i don't want to say i don't disagree exactly with the

professor but i guess what i'm suggesting, there's different levels of degrees of congressionalism. and so this is more -- i'm more interested to see what folks like senator paul and senator cruz and some candidates interested in the issue will talk about in future. in 2008 it was president obama saying i'm a new guy, here's the view, very simple. the president cannot use military force unless unilaterally without any imminent threat to the united states. what i consider the extreme position that president obama took in 2008.

that position is gone in the sense that that extreme position, he can't act and use military force without congress unless there's an actual or imminent threat to the united states, that is off the table. and i think put that off the table is libya 2011 where he explicitly claimed that what i consider extreme congressional iflt position. i don't intend to argue that president obama is in any way an extreme presidentialist. my point was he's moved off from what i consider to be the extreme congressionalist view and that extreme congressionalist view, which is actually the view shared by a lot of leading scholars and many politicians, that extreme congressionalist view is not supportive, not practical. no modern president and i predict any president who enters the office will not actually

follow that extreme statement he made back in 2008, that the president cannot use military force without congress unless there's an actual imminent attack. now, i don't mean to suggest that he argues that for instance if congress comes later and tries to restrict the president, they can't restrict them. i don't take myself believe that's a very good view. the point is that congress can -- when congress doesn't act, i think the view that article 2 authorizes and i think president obama now recognizes authorizes the use of military force abroad, even without a specific congressional authorization and without an actual or imminent threat to the united states. that's the narrow argument. but i think it's take fair one given not so much the practical issues that the administration has been wrestling with over the past seven years, but the broad rush claims that we are -- we love congress and support congress, not all about a different power. it's a more complicated view. that's the point i'm trying to make here. and i don't disagree that with really in some ways like all

administration,s it's not consistent. i think i would agree with the president's characterization of the administration has often made very difficult maybe even wrong or knowingly wrong legal arguments under statutes because they don't want to make the obvious article two argument in other context outside the one i was discussing such as the bergdahl issue or the other context we mentioned. i wouldn't suggest a full presidentialist but moved off what i consider the extreme congressionalist view. >> thank you. >> so now i'd like to open it up to questions from the floor. if you would please komg up to the microphone if you have any questions. to your right. i understand. >> if you don't mind, please.

>> i didn't think of it before i came here, the colonel has talked about enduring -- enduring -- what did you say -- we've been in germany, japan, korea for 70 years or so, are those in the category of enduring operations? >> not in the way that the president is using in the aproposed aumf, we're there based on treaty, korea based on treaty and agreements with germany and nato treaty. >> now, you haven't spoken of any specific war powers authorizations during korea and vietnam era. i don't know if there were any. if someone wanted to put an end

to the vietnam war, mechanic of congress introduced legislation and congress declined to declare war on north vietnam while in full military operations, what would happen? >> i think this is a good question that goes to the professor's discussion about the presidential view. if that were to happen, it's not unreasonable or not unreasonable interpretation for the president to declare that congress is infringing on his independent executive authority. you could get to a broader discussion of the idea of presidential power specifically in a situation where congress is going directly contrary to some military operation the president is trying to participate in. >> i'm done. >> i don't think the view that congress cannot restrict at all against military action. i think what i'm suggesting is congress does not always have to initiate it which people try to

talk about a lot, unless it's after the fact notion that a president -- >> i'm not sure you understood the question properly. it would have delivered to the nation and the world and enemy a -- is this coming through, working? that the congress doesn't want it even though the president was, whether or not the president has the authority. thank you. >> come on up. >> my name is david freeman. before i have my question, congress did do what the previous questioner asked, repealed the resolution and next claimed under article 2 that he had the right to continue the war. i have a question for the

professor. in 1991 and 2002, both president bushes sought congressional authorization and received, assuming they did not under your view of the presidential war power, if it committed u.s. forces to those operations, would that have been unconstitutional or constitutional? >> i think that as long as congress doesn't spechkally abandon it, i think it won constitutional to execute military action in both cases just as it was constitutional for president -- even though congress did not authorize, i was thinking about it, there was a declaration of war introduced which was not supported and voted down by the republican house. i think that's why -- i think congress come in and say you have to get out like they did in vietnam but i'm not sure --

watching military action, i think they can do so. >> there are virtually no limits. >> the limit is congress can stop them or congress -- people noted every two years congress has a funding bill and they can and has voted the bill be defunded. it can restrict war powers if it chooses to certainly under the funding clause or other statutes after the fact to limit the operations. my point is that initiation of the military force. i think the precedence suggests that the president has broad use of military force, absent congressional ban or prohibition on it. >> does professor goodman agree with that? >> no, i think there has to be some limit. i think if we're saying that taking the nation to war, i think having congress the power

to declare war is part of the idea even if we don't have declarations of war we have authorizations to use force, kind of a requirement. the president certainly has a residual authority to act but that's in defense of nation. against something like an imminent attack in which there's actually no time really to go to congress. even in that situation, one would think after a certain period of time when it's no longer imminent, and if it's going to be a long-term commitment by the nation, that's -- >> so -- inaudible ]. >> kosovo might be, the only question is dan, one other element -- i should also say caveat, i'm not a constitutional law scholar. >> i'm just curious. >> just i should register the caveat. there's the other question which

the clinton administration tried to justify which is that congress then appropriated funds and did the appropriation of funds count as authorization? i also think it might be some of the background game that the administration is playing now with respect to isil, which is even if congress doesn't get its act together to approve an authorization at a certain point, the administration is going to be asking but they already asked for large amounts of funds. if they ask to carry out operations, congress funds that, there we go. congress has implicitly given some form of authority. i think it's troubling, deeply troubling and in some sense we're taking the most extreme kinds of conflicts or cases but i wouldn't have a problem reretrospectively thinking did clinton act without authority but maybe so -- >> it's a fair question, and one of the interesting thoughts, why would president bush famed unilateral -- why did he go to

congress? it's unclear what he thought he had the authority. fair suggestion he thought he did have authority. the reason why presidents go to congress is not for legal but for practical and political. i totally agree that it would be better in every way for congress to authorize -- especially substantial and before it actually happens and any presidents do so -- there's literature, when they think they'll be engaged for a long time, they are more likely to seek authorization ahead of time to get political -- my point is simply that as a practical matter and legal matter. the president has and president obama's administration argue they have the power to initiate military force even if it's not in response to actual or attack without congress. >> if i might just with a follow-up question.

in the context of a, for example, invasion of iraq, how will you regard whether president bush needed congress's approval beforehand presumably the war powers resolution would have kicked in and acted as a limit on a a kind of traditional conventional use of force there where u.s. ground troops were introduced into hostilities. and i guess the question is if we're looking at the war powers through the conflicts of the 21st century and whether it's legal or practical, a president is going to want to see congress buy-in before committing american troops to a long-term conflict overseas but those conflicts seem to be increasingly the exception and the new conflicts raised with limited use of troops and special forces and more with the use of drone strikes.

and other methods of conducting armed conflicts in the norm. the question is, is it a sense this congressional buy-in, whether legal or practical fading as a result of the realities of armed conflict today. >> i actually don't -- to some agree with respect to the initial use of force, i think congress will always be deeply involved through the funding and by the way as a footnote, i think one of the reasons the obama administration became embedded with the 2001 aumf for the isil action is because they were worried about the war crimes resolution and couldn't get around the war crimes resolution just on an article 2 argument because -- even if they believed they have the inherent authority to go into iraq and

syria to go after isil, that goes out after 60 or 90 days. they didn't -- i don't even myself believe that the president can override the statute. my point is that once congress doesn't stop or initiate the course. >> it's hard to -- i mean administration argued that libya wasn't a violation of the war crimes. on its face, it seems like it was a violation of war powers act. but i certainly -- seems like congressional -- probably more consistent with the founders consistent with realities, particularly today, more practical and just more consistent with modern warfare. >> yes, please. >> my name is phil bronener, i would like to ask if any member of the committee would support

the proposition that the authorization by the congress of the funding for specific activities proposed by the administration in syria or iraq or otherwise, in concert with the pending war powers proposal, could be read constitutionally as a de facto authorization of force that has been requested. >> other arguments and pretty much every conflict where congress didn't have a specific authorization, it was made in korea and vietnam. that is one of its arguments as to why it's use of force is per missible and supported by congress. >> in this case, however,

there's a debate in the committees that focuses on the change in the structure of the defense budget pretty much to get past problems of sequestration but the result would be under one proposal, a much more focused allocation of resources. does that make a difference? >> i suppose it could under the theory that the clinton administration promulgated with respect to kosovo. i expect if you have specific appropriations for the ongoing operations, then under that theory, yes. but i'm not sure -- time not supporting the theory. the other concern might be if you have forces on the ground or

in theater, maybe congress by appropriating funds rather than taking back funds is just trying to protect the troops, not a signal that they approve of the operations but rather with those kinds of facts on the ground, they have no choice but to support the troops financially. but that shouldn't be read to be that they actually support the operations as a political matter that they would authorize them. i think there's -- some of the competing concerns how you would interpret it and war powers resolution itself in terms of as an assertion of congressional authority says appropriations shouldn't count. >> thank you for that answer. one follow-up if i may. >> yes, please.

>> it's striking that the administration picked three years as it's sunset date with length of a congressional appropriation cannot exceed two years as was mentioned by one of the panel earlier. do you have any idea why three years was chosen? >> i don't know three years in particular, but i do think. that they wanted it to be a determination made by a

they are. >> can i keep going? >> we'll wrap up after a follow up. >> >> i haven't heard anyone describe any coherent argument other than the ones that have been considered deriving from the congress as justification for inactivity. >> can you clarify what you mean by inactivity. >> there's been a proposal for -- >> failure to take action on a

authorization? >> yes. >> well, there's never going to be complete inactivity because as we talked about, you still have the funding issue, so they have to continue to fund the military and fund the operation. so there will never be absolutely no activity. >> i think also, you know, the administration may not be excited if it gets voted down, right? so i think there's a political split in the congress like there is in the country i think. some people think they want a tougher -- they're not happy with limitations. some of the critics in congress are not that they don't want to authorize it, they want to vote to authorize it. and there's some folks that don't want to authorize anything. if you can't build a coalition, it's a simple political reason.

why does congress not act? it usually is because they're divided and can't agree, frankly, like the country. >> and just to further that same line of thought, the chair of the senate foreign relations committee has said that at this point he doesn't have democratic support for the president's authorization because of the lack of limitations in it, and he's unwilling to kind of pass an authorization along party lines because of the signal that that then sends. it's more of a political argument, not a legal or constitutional argument, but the signal it sends to isil and the potential allies, iraq, if we, in fact, pass an authorization but it's right down party lines.

and then you could blame either party. could you say that the democrats aren't accepting it without their limitations and the republicans aren't giving any limitations. so it's two knows where you apportion the blame. and then the second part i think that senator corker is saying in a certain respect is and then why should i pour so much political capital and the rest of it into this when the administration is telling me they don't even need it? if the administration were coming and saying we really need this from you as an additional authority that we otherwise don't have, maybe so, then they can justify that, but if the administration says we just want to hear from you but if you don't do it, we're -- nothing is going to change on the ground, he kind of said i'm a person who wants to do something to make a difference. if it's not going to make a difference on the ground according to the administration, then why? >> it seems that the public pressure that was building or around -- when the issue first came up before the midterms has dissipated somewhat, which relieves i think pressure on the actors, particularly in light of what julianne and ryan pointed out. well, i wanted to thank our panelists for an incredibly rich discussion of this important topic that goes to fundamental questions about our constitutional structure and the role of the president and congress in what are challenging and changing times. if you had join me in a round of applause for our panelists, thank you very much. and thank you all for coming.

coming up today on c-span road to the white house coverage at 1:45 eastern. that starps atts at 1:45 eastern. rick santorum will announce his run for 2016. this is his second time running for president. first time was 2012. that's live at 5:00 p.m. eastern. you can see all of this on our companion network, c-span.

the manhattan institute spoke about black researchers. it was held to mark the 50th anniversary of a study on black america contacted by daniel patrick moynahan. he later represented new york in the senate. >> good morning. maybe we can get started. good morning, everyone. my name is jay seeson riley. i'm a senior fellow. i'd like to welcome everyone to our symposium which is titled prospects for black america.

white america symposium you're in the wrong room. that would be any of the other rooms in the building. i'll be very brief with my remarks because we have some excellent panels lined up. i want to give them as much time as possible for discussion. i'll get a chance to speak a little later on this afternoon. i hope you can stick around. i began working at the manhattan institute in february of this year. the idea for this conference on race first occurred to me many years ago when i was still on staff at the wall street. i came across a book called the fairmont papers that is a transcription of a conference that occurred in the 1980s at the fairmont hotel in san

francisco. it was titled black alternatives. soul gave the opening remarks where he noted the economic and social advancement of blacks in this country is still a great unfinished task. he said methods and approaches being used to advance blacks demand re-examination. he said there's growing factual evidence of counterproductive results from noble intentions and the goal of the conference with was to explore alternative approaches. that's why we're here to explore alternatives. he said the people who were invited to speak here are people seeking alternatives. people who have challenged conventional wisdom on one or many issues. people who think for themselves.

some are democrats, some are republicans, some are liberals. some are conservatives. all are open to assessing what's been tried in terms of public policy aimed at helped black underclass. finally noted that america's been through a historic phase of struggle for basic civil rights for blacks. the struggle that was necessary but not sufficient. he said the very success of that struggle created flu edd new priorities and new urgencies. the schools that work i communities. he said all that back in 1980. i must have come across it in the late 1990s. now here we are in 2015 and i think those sentiments are any less relevant today. a few years after i discovered

the fairmont papers i became friends with seoul who will be 85 this year and has yet another book out. it will be out next month. i just got the gallies in the mall last week. i asked him about that conference. i asked him about it several times over the years. he said it went well. got a lot of press coverage lot of good feedback. he said he had every intention of hosting a second one but the plan fell through and he never got around to it. i said that's the kind of conference we need. if someone else is hosting it i've never been invited. after i joined the manhattan institute i figured i'd give it a shot, and so here we are. i hope we can proceed in the spirit that seoul described honestly evaluating what's been described in alternative approaches. we know the conventional

explanations for the black white gaps we see today in education, incarceration incomes et cetera. the conventional wisdom is it's mainly about residual racism. the legacy of slavery and jim crow, et cetera. it's to call for more government resources, more government programs, more wealth redistribution and so forth. the people asked to participate in today's symposium all bring something new to these discussions. they're not afraid to think outside the box about addressing these problems. they're open to new approaches and just as important they're willing to honestly evaluate what's been tried already. what's working and what's not working. quite a lot isn't working. this year we're marking the 50th anniversary of daniel patrick moynahan's report on the black

family. it remains controversial today. the fundamental problem is a family structure is that the negro family in the urban ghettos is crumbling. for his troubles he was denounced as a victim blaming racist then undermining the civil rights movement. his findings were ignored by public policy makers including the great society architects who would go onto expand old programs and formulate new ones that exacerbated the problems. single parenting was subsidized. history proved he was onto something. about 25% of black children and

5% of the white children lived in households headed by a single mother. during the next 20 years the black percentage would double and the racial gap would widen. today more than 70% of all black are to unmarried one, twice the white percentage. researchers shown the likelihood of teen pregnancy, drug abuse dropping out of school and many other problems grew dramatically when fathers were absent. the most critical factor affecting the prospect that male youth be encounter the criminal justice system is the presence of father in the home. unfortunately, the report ultimately -- i should say it was an attempt to have an honest conversation about family break down in black pathology. one that many today still refuse to join faulting ghetto culture

for ghetto outcomes remains largely taboo. an op-ed carried the headline black culture is not the problem. what is the problem? according to this author the problem is white racism. quote, the problem originates in a political culture that has long bound black bodies to questions of property. yes, i'm referring to slavery, unquote. i'm hoping the discussions today will be a little less reductive than that and a little more honest. black crime rates in 1960 were lower than they are today. if the legacy of slavery explains the level of black crime today that legacy must have skipped a couple of generations then reasserted

itself. his goal was to better define problem that many thought mistakenly in his view was no big deal and would solve itself in the wake of civil rights gains. his skepticism was warranted. before we get started with the panels i want to thank a few people. larry moan who signed off on this event. dean ball, lee harrington. i want to thank them all for their hard work. i'd like to invite the first panelist up and while they're getting miked i can read their bios.

he was the first governor of 36 years when he was elected. he read investments h is important for our discussion today. he authored maryland's first public charter school law which enabled more than 7,000 students to attend 30 new public charter schools. heather mac donald is a contributing editor to city journal. her work has canvassed a range of topics including homeland security, immigration policing, homelessness and education policy.

her books include "are cops racist?" a city journalage agenalysis that investigates policing. she's a non-practicing lawyer and clerked. she's also the recipient of the 2005 bradley prize for outstanding intellectual achievement. john mcwhorter. he's the author of all about the beat, white hip hop can't save black america. the author of losing the race as well as a book called winning the race beyond the crisis in black america. john is also a linguist who

teaches in the english and comparative english department in columbia university. the panel will be moderated by judge william kuntz. serves on the u.s. district court for the eastern district of new york. judge kuntz was previously a commercial litigator in private practice in new york. the title of the first panel is reducing crime rates in the black community. i'll let judge kuntz take it from here. thank you.

>> before we begin i would like you to join me in a moment of silence in respect for the new york police officer bryan moore who died yesterday. he was 25 years old and he was patrolling in my parents old neighborhood of queens village, new york. thank you. we have a curious tradition. one in which people who have established themselves as experts. people who are well known to you, people who are well spoken, and people who need no introduction receive an introduction from someone who is obscure to you, not known at all

and you're wondering what is he doing up there. that would be me. my name is bill kuntz. i was born in bed-stuy, raised in harlem. my father and mother raised me and my younger brother. lived in queens village as a teenager. i wanted to tell you how important this panel is both personally and professionally. today we are going to consider the fact and i've had the preliminary discussion with our panelists that as the murder of police officer moore demonstrated yesterday there is no such thing as a routine police civilian encounter not

for the police officer not for the citizen. for 23 years i served on the review board reviewing allegations of police in new york city. each and every one of those complaints, were meritorious or not was unique. each and every one of those encounters had the potential for deadly force or for some of the most exhilarating and uplifting encounters between our citizens and our law enforcement officials. each had the potential for heroism or disaster. i would hope when you leave this discussion panel today you would exorcise from your vocabulary the phrase "routine police encounter." there is no such thing.

mindful of that tradition, i will now turn this over to our truly distinguished panel, our knowledgeable experts, and we will begin with the former governor of maryland. >> so a week ago sunday i was driving my 11-year-old and my 15-year-old back from perry hall, maryland. we were driving down the expressway. i figured you know what? we'll just cut up north avenue go back to annapolis and cut over to hilton street. the streets are very familiar to me and i did. and we pulled up to a light and there was a little african-american girl and she was waving to us. i think the parents recognized me and my kids. and we drove our way home to

annapolis, maryland. all nice and happy. and less than 18 hours later that intersection that i drove past was the center of the universe with regard to race and riots and police and more bad press for a city i grew up in right outside baltimore city. so when you talk about personal someone who grew up in maryland, whose dad worked very close to that intersection a college comp i had championed as governor be a cvs i knew very well friends in that neighborhood. it's very personal. very personal. so as a result obviously of the past few days, all of the tv folks have been calling and getting me on their shows and asking me why, what, where what do you think?

and i have to say that my initial thoughts were probably the same thoughts everyone in this room had. the first thought was, on the first day, when those kids some of them from douglas high school, some from other high schools, gathered together and began to do their thing, your first thought was where are the fathers? more fathers less rioters. knowing the academic achievements, or lack thereof of some of these area schools and past battles i fought, particularly as governor, against unions and others who protect monopolies negligent monopolies my second thought was, more degrees less rioters. as someone who had authored a national review online in

october, 50 years since moynihan, and i recommend it to all of you. my thought was, more sentencing statutes that make sense, less rioters. more drug laws that make sense less rioters. and so after these initial thoughts thoughts, during these interview processes, as days unfolded, i also began to think about the fact of this case and what was truly at issue here. because these were consequences of failed policies for decades. but what were the facts of this case? how did a severed spine result from this particular transport? who was negligent, who was not? who should be held responsible?

and the real issue here, which is police practices, much less race. although it is race, race race race, race because race equals ratings. but police practices and what happened with regard to this particular prisoner in that van that night. and we don't know. we don't know. but we'll find out. we'll certainly find out. my concluding comment is this. as someone who has been a state legislator, in congress and governor i certainly lyly would indulge, to some extent, the idea of healing. who's against healing? we have to heal. but if it's healing on familiar terms, if it's the same old m.o., if it's the same old

paradigm as you heard out of the president's mouth the other day, and others, we need more money. $22 trillion. to fix a great society. if that's the premise, im'm not going to play. those folks in those neighborhoods shouldn't play. policymakers shouldn't play. and we should not indulge it. because if it's just that nobody should be surprised if we see a repeat in three months, six months, nine months three years, ten years. and as someone who's driven through these neighborhoods my entire life, i wouldn't be surprised to see the same conditions, if it is the same paradigm. so maybe hopefully, just you pray that something good can come of this. nothing good's come from this yet. but maybe this conference, this

conversation these values can actually become a part of the agenda. not just in annapolis, but in washington, d.c. if that's the case, something good will have come from this. >> thank you. we will have opening statements from john and then from heather. and then we're going to have a discussion amongst the panelists. then we will have questions from our learned audience as well. >> judge kuntz if i have value to this event, it is as a responder. i am much better at hearing a text than saying something. i believe heather mcdonald should go second. therefore, i will take that as a friendly amendment. although as judge hays didn't do his workhomework. >> i'd also translate john's

remark as i want the last word. but we'll let that pass. i'll have the postscript. for the last nine months our nation has been convulsed by a movement called black lives matter. that movement was triggered by the fatal police shooting of michael brown in ferguson, missouri last summer and it triggered riots, die-ins, a movement to eliminate traditional grand jury proceedings whether a police officer uses lethal force. and a presidential task force on policing. the premise of that black lives matter movement boils down to essentially that the police are the biggest threat facing young black men today. i want to propose a counter high

hypothesis hypothesis. there is no organization dedicated to the black lives matter campaign than police. now every unjustified police shooting or death by other means is an unmitigated tragedy and the police have to work incessantly to refine their tactics, to make sure that they don't misperceive threat. and the police also have an indefeasible obligation to treat everyone they encounter with courtesy and respect, and that obligation is too often violated. the police develop very rough attitudes on the street be in part because of the behavior that they receive in trying to make arrests or investigate crimes. but that civilian behavior is no excuse for treating people rudely and peremptorily.

nevertheless in new york city alone today, 10000 minority males are alive who would have been dead had homicide rates remained at their early 1990s levels. and what saved those lives was a revolution in policing that began in 1994 and that has continued and spread throughout the country. and the essential aspects of that revolution is an obsession with crime data, analyzing crime data on a daily if not hourly basis, to try and figure out where crime patterns are emerging, and accountability for police precinct commanders. it used to be that nobody assumed that the police could control crime or held them accountable for it. and now the nypd is ruthless about imposing responsibility on precinct commanders. if they do not save black lives

their careers are at jeopardy. what happened in new york, thanks to this revolution in policing, was to liberate the law abiding residents of inner city neighborhoods to be able to go out into the public, to shop to go to the store, pick up their mail in the post office elderly women could come down into the lobbies of their buildings without being fearful of drug dealers. and there's one other thing that drives new york policing now, and that's community demands for assistance. right now we're seeing a movement to de-police, de-criminalize. in new york there is an effort to cut back on broken windows

policing, which is the idea of enforcing low level quality of life offenses. it is said to unfairly burden minority communities. if this push to decriminalize becomes effective it's going to involve ignoring the very people whom the advocates purport to represent. police low-level offenses is a moral imperative. i have never gone to a police community meeting in harlem or the south bronx or central brooklyn when i haven't heard variance of the following requests -- you arrest drug dealers and they're back on the corner the next day. why can't you get them off the streets? tlm there's kids hanging out in my lobby smoking weed. why can't you arrest them for

loitering? i smell weed in the hallway. somebody's breaking the law here. i met an elderly cancer amputee in the mount hope section of the bronx who is terrified to go into her lobby and get her mail because of the youth hanging out there. she said please, jesus, send more police. the only time she felt safe was when the police were there. so i'll conclude while we need constantly to work on police community relations what is being lost i think in this discussion is that, to date, short of -- i would agree with the judge -- rebuilding the black family. the second best solution to giving the same rights of public safety and freedom to inner city neighborhoods that the wealthy

enjoy is sound and effective proactive policing. thank you. >> thank you. john, as the last responder, would you like to respond? >> i would. >> okay. >> this is how i see the issue that this panel is devoted to. it is definitely true that it would be ideal if we could do what we're calling rebuilding the black family. obviously that's true. there are various things that go on that i don't think need to be spelled out again here that idealing would not be inging inging -- idealing be going on. but what is the likelihood those changes are going to happen whether or not we say they're going to. and after 50 years, i think it is quite clear there is no way to kkree kree

create a movement in black america. we have to determine what we mean here. could it be that a certain number of black leaders and columnists started making a certain call for the rebuilding of the black family and it would be effective. let's face it if, say, 1 out of 2 of those black leaders and columnists made that call then they would be raked over the coals by the usual suspects. so "the atlantic" and "slate" and all of the other people would talk about what horrible human beings these leaders and columnists and academics were for not understanding the role of irnsnstitutional racism in the past. now, would those people end up crying or need to go into therapy? no. but the point is what would result is convocations and op-eds where people battle it out whether we're talking about culture or the system and the result would be a draw. nobody would learn anything and

nothing would clang.hange. that's what would happen if 1 out of 2 people decided to devote them selves to rebuilding the black family. if al sharpton decided to take that line, michael eric dyson would write a 10,000-new piece in the -- >> but cornel west would no longer write the forward. >> there you go. and things would move on. let's say somehow all black leaders -- or even 95% black academics and black columnists decided that the black family needed to be rebuilt and they said it. well's let's face it there is too much diversity of opinion in the black community for that to be a possibility. would it be nice? yes. but could it happen? no. there's too much diversity now. even under jim crow, there was more diversity in black opinion than we tend to remember. i don't just mean due boys and washington. in 1955, there was massive

diversity in the black community such that was hard to say what the black voice was. certainly now there never will be that consensus. it would be nice if there would be, but it can't be. so, my being a linguist i know in this setting seems like some sort of abstraction. that's this other thing that i do. most people have no way of knowing what linguistics is. i used to say that my race work and my linguistics work were completely separate. but that's less true as i get older. linguistics is a problem solving discipline. it is not about police pentagon people's gram popular. it is not about speaking other languages. it is actually half humanities and half science. it's taught in the same way as engineering and biology. one must work things out. and increasingly i'm realizing that my take on race issues in america is based on the idea of how can we solve the problem, and solving the problem is not always through the way that might seem most intuitive. when i see something like

baltimore. when i see something like ferguson. and when you see these things repeating themselves, it seems to me that what you're looking for is one solution, one card that you could pull that will make the whole house fall down. and i don't think that it's a call for change in the black family. that doesn't seem to work. but could something else work? and i think it would. so for example, heather you're mentioning the people in the projects who want to get these people off of the streets who are peddling drugs. that is very real. that is very true. i wish more of america would understand that black communities themselves want more policing. but, in terms of this endless cycle that we go through i find myself thinking, here's this person who is keeping the wolf from the door by selling drugs. now, why is he doing that? well, because drugs can be sold for a mark-up.

so you're not going to get rich but you can keep the wolf from the door. and if you had a terrible education and not much of a life, and you drop out of school after 11th grade well, what are you going to do? well, in 1935 you could get a job in a factory. well, you're not going to do that now, and yet people still drop out of school, 10th or 11th grade. what are you going to do? when those people get killed selling drugs the newspaper will say they worked odd jobs. that's a euphemism for if you dropped out of school after 10th or 11th grade because it wasn't doing anything for you well then you might go into this drug trade, which is there because drugs are illegal and therefore can be sold for a mark-up. so you look at this entire situation. i find myself thinking not at some sort of libertying about drug use, but as somebody who thinks wouldn't it be nice if cops and kids like freddie gray didn't encounter one another so often. how can you get those people

away from each other? suppose there was no such thing as being picked up by a cop because of your possession of or your sale of this and that. because if you couldn't keep the wolf from the door by selling these things, then what would happen? i have all reason to predict is that fewer people would drop out of school. and even a person who was dealing with being underserved and being given a bad hand would have no choice but to get a job. if i were somebody living in an inner city community and i had been underserved by my school and my father hadn't been around, i could very much imagine that i might want to do a job that would involve not leaving my neighborhood, not learning a new way to talk, spending time with my friends, with a looming possibility of getting really rich. i could use that. however, if that possibility didn't exist, then i would go get low level work and hopefully build. in other words, it would go back to the way even poor black communities were before.

and so black people and crime. my thought is that the linchpin of black people and crime is the drug issue. jack riley is the head of the dea in chicago. he says that 90% of black vim violent crimes are about drugs and gang wars and turf. so there's often a conversation we have about black people and violence. as if the violence is -- i don't know where this violence is supposed to come from. but the fact that there is drugs is one thing. but a lot of violent crime is not just because people like to fight. it's because people are in gangs. what's a gang for? it's not "west side story." the gang is not so people can hang out together and snap their fingers and do little dances. the gang is for selling drugs. that's what it's for. if drugs weren't illegal then there wouldn't be a gang to be in. and next thing you know there would be less violence, people wouldn't have guns. black people have no love of

guns innately. the guns are there because of patrolling the turf. it seems to me that what we're really talking about is getting rid of the war on drugs. not because that's an issue that's natively important to me, but because i think that that would keep the cops and these men away from each other. and it would give an incentive for these men to seek legal work and to not be in danger of being imprisoned or killed. now it's easy to think in conclusion -- >> yes. >> -- that it's asking too much of these men. and i would say that to think that these men would not get jobs if there were nothing to do but get those jobs, is like being someone in 1996 saying that with welfare reformed, black women are going to be shivering on subway grates. that didn't happen then and it wouldn't happen to black men now. i think we just need to try it. thank you. >> well, you know, the repeal of prohibition resulted in the end of organized it crime and the

mafia in new york city. governor what's your view of legalizing narcotics to keep the wolf from the door? >> you know, where i was born, the cops would come around and shake down the numbers runners. i grew up in an apartment complex in the '50s '60s outside baltimore. then in the '70s one day i awakened and the state was -- you got to play to win. everybody said that the street number would go away. it didn't. i wonder whether that analogy is going to hold true with regard to drugs as well. >> leather -- >> i'll just add this. your case is compelling and very articulate and i love listening to it. i just -- as someone who's thought about this a lot you wonder, one, whether it's true, whether that would actually

occur. and, two whether you're treating a criminal justice problem for a public health problem. which you are to some extent. >> very much. >> heather. >> yeah. if we're going to legalize drugs, i think let's not do it on a raised ground. i think there may be reasons to do so. i'm largely agnostic about it. i would just disagree that to treat this as some overwhelming magnet for illegal behavior, i recommend a book by alice goffman called "on the run." this was a university of pennsylvania aspiric academic in sociology who lived six years in the philadelphia -- sort of the inner city and befriended a group of young crack dealers. got extremely involved in their

lives and wrote a book about their existence. i disagree with the point of view she ends up blaming the law and criminal justice system for their own decisions to break the law, but what she points out to her credit is a group of clean people who simply choose not to sell drugs or commit robberies. so there are probably the majority of people in the inner city who are not involved in the drug trade. they are making choices to abide by the law. they stay clear of the dirty people, and robert woodson has long said we should be studying the success cases and not be always obsessing about the failures. and there's -- that's a very

valid point. i would also argue i spoke earlier about this data-driven revolution that reform -- just transformed policing and brought about the longest and steepest crime drop in history both in new york and nationally. that is known as the comp stat revolution. prosecution is now trying to use the same techniques of data-driven analysis to try to decide how to prosecute cases. i looked at some of the massive conspiracy gang cases that the manhattan d.a. brought in east harlem. and through riding social media and using their prosecutorial resources to target the worst criminals, they got these massive gangs off the streets. none of these gangs who were shooting each other had anything

to do with drug dealing. it is not the case, especially today when you have crews that the only grounds for violence on the streets is a spin-off of drugs. in fact the drug trade has gotten more peaceful of late because thanks to new york policing which has driven it indoors. but the violence continues. and john by no means discounted the importance of rebuilding the family but i would still opt for that. conservatives have their root causes, liberals have their root causes. liberals are getting rid of poverty and income inequality and the conservative root cause is the breakdown of the family. i wouldn't give up on that so quickly. i think that we have never tried a full-scale rhetorical crusade

to revalorize the importance of fathers. that is something that is really taboo today to speak about that, but that's what we've got to do. >> i want to ask the governor to respond to that, and also to talk about it in terms of the issues of federalism and local control. policing has traditionally been something that location communities engage in. we now have situations where attorney generals of the united states are asked to power shoot into local law enforcement issues despite the differences in the police force in terms of race and demographics between ferguson and baltimore and new york. the question i've got is is policing local? is it national? we've talked about the war on drugs. we have he a talked about comp stat which was new york city driven. where are we in terms of policing? is it local?

is it national? is it international? >> it's all three. but with regard to public interaction with the state police force it's 95% local as we know. which is why you do what you do. right? and so again i i'd feel a whole lot better about the national debate if it was about that issue which is really the crux of the issue in baltimore right now. what happened in this case. what process and procedures were followed or not followed. how did this guy ends up with a severed spine? you articulately depressed me with your initial comments because i'm sitting here -- i don't agree with you but you've made such a compelling case that i'm sitting here, geez i'm depressed. but, i do believe that there has

never been a concerted effort -- and i understand there's going to be the left and the progressives are going to do their "ism" thing and "ic" thing. everybody's going to be deem oning to demonized. we have to learn not to care. i've been called everything. i'm a republican in maryland. hostility does not intimidate me. and at some point just the common sense notion that fathers in those homes telling the 15-year-old about -- and the mother now has become the national symbol. but i wonder how many fathers in those homes, if they were there, could have had a, hey, you ain't going out there, you're doing your homework. you're going to practice. no. and we haven't had that. in fact, it's just been one long

steep decline since -- since the '60s. and so i'm willing to try it, but it has to be everybody all in, and it has to be nobody really cares what the left says about you because once you do you're going to be intimidated and you're going to be scared to lose a race, you're going to be scared to be called a racist. and if you're scared you can't play in this league. >> well, i'm from brooklyn. >> i know, you're not scared. >> we're not scared of anything. good fellas wolf of wall street. i got four isis guys i got to try. you know. i got mobsters. gam belowbino soldiers. it's just another day at the beach. >> governor, you missed my point though, with all due respect. it is not a matter of being scared. sure, people say mean things about you in the comment section, et cetera. it's just that in the black

community, what would result is a debate with -- >> no, you're right. >> -- with people talking about it. i don't mean the debate would be unpleasant because of its at moss sphere. the result atmosphere. the result of the debate would be that person said some deep things, that person said some deep things will you it would be a draw. there could not be any consensus among the people so there would be no change in black communities because no unified message could come out. >> you say that but the president a few months ago said exactly what we're talking about. >> and gets roasted every time he does it bysaying he's talking down to the black community. >> we need a president who says okay, i have your opinion, but i have five decades of evidence and common sense that you're wrong and i'm going to say it repeatedly. i understand your point. those folks are not going away but i just think that it is worth a try. not mutually exclusive of any other strategy but it is worth a

try because past -- not just politicians but pastors, community leaders, if more people sing from the same page i think we have a shot not to cure it but maybe to turn it around a little bit. >> heather, you think it is a guy thing or what? >> well no. i mean i think both sides are responsible to decide not to have a child within the context of a marriage. we often blame the fathers for their lack of personal responsibility which is valid, but also i think mothers need to understand that the most advantage that they can give their child is their father. and if they're not prepared to marry the father of their child the fact of the matter is you shouldn't be having a child. and that's a hard thing to say because i think we have a sense of entitlement that everybody has a right to a child today.

but that may be in the abstract true. but it is a recipe for hardship. we don't want to encroach on later panels because the data and facts behind the difficulty of single parenting will be much more exhaustively analyzed i'm sure. but i would just agree, i guess, with the governor that i think we just haven't tried it. and one of the reasons we haven't tried it is the dominance of feminism and the conceit that strong women can do it all. and men are basically being disappeared in our culture. so if everybody -- if we could get unanimity about the fact that, no children need their mothers and their fathers, i think it's premature to say that would have no effect at least on the margins on the way people think about child rearing. and marriage would not -- fathers would not be viewed as

an optional add-on or a frill which is kind of the way they're viewed now. >> the notion of father as accessory. i got three kids. it's a little scary. all right, i promised you we would have an opportunity for questions. i'm going to pretend that i'm back in my courtroom and i'm going to say is there a question somewhere in that speech? and it's not zbrg to begoing to be pretty. it's up to you. ma'am, we'll start with you. then you. keep your voice up. >> cheryl washington with the national center for state courts. i'm struck by the nexus between what's described as the left's position regarding poverty and income inequality. and what the speakers characterized as the right's position for concern about the breakdown of the family. and the fact that those two are so interrelated.

so many of the women i know who have had husbands and children with husbands often marriages break down because of the fact that they are making more money what have you. you know the men sometimes can't find jobs and other families, there are so many men who are going to prison for low-level drug related crimes. >> so your question is -- >> my question is do you see where those two are so related and the fact that there's a lot of discussion about the sweet or the street. and you see in a lot of communities where a lot of drug use goes on in the college dorm suite versus in poor communities in the street. can you talk about the nexus between not being able to get a job -- >> we have the question. go ahead. >> well, first of all, very few people are going to prison for drug use. that's a fallacy.

and prison remains a lifetime achievement award for persistence in criminal offending. this thug -- i'm going to use the word thug without apology -- who shot a police officer lethally in new york city over the weekend, he had an unbelievable rap sheetunbleev abl unbelievable rap sheet. he's out on the streets. the pressures are still to keep coop people out. if you can't keep that guy in. i just don't accept the excuse that young men have to sell drugs in order to have a livelihood because every day there are people in poor communities who are going to jobs and doing the right thing. people -- and i know the argument to say, well, how can you expect marriage when we have this mass incarceration complex.

well they're making babies before they're in prison. you know so they weren't in prison when they conceived that child child. so prison is not what's responsible for them not being fathers. pits's their own decision to pro create and not be responsible for their children. >> one of the most pernicious myths about black america is the idea that the reason for black men taking to the streets is that there are no jobs available to them. heather is absolutely right about that. the data is absolutely crushing. read "on the run" by alice goffman. read "gang leader for a day" by a colombia sociologist. read william julius wilson's work. in between the lines of all of those texts which are cherished by liberals and the left, it is

quite clear that the problem in inner city communities is not that there's no way for a black man to work. and this is hard to say. especially with a voice like mine, it sounds like i'm being moralistic. i'm really not. but it's not that there aren't jobs available. there aren't wonderful jobs. but it's not there aren't jobs available. it is that we live in a time when it's possible not to take one of those jobs. and the question is, well, how are you going to make money? and i come back to my point. and as far as statistics from 2001 to 2013 over half of black men who are in federal penitentiaries are there for drug possession or sale. another 16% in federal are there saying that they did something violent or they stole something to get drugs. the figures are lower for state penitentiaries. but nevertheless, the drug issue is very important. and i think it is clear that once drug sale took over black

communities, the level of violence in black communities shot up alarmingly and became part of the reason that we're here. if you read about a black community in the '60s and '70s one of the oddest things from our vantage point 40 and 50 years later was there was so much less violence. people complained about what there was. you find out it was about switchblades and things. everything changes with the whole drug culture and context. so it is those two things. one, it's not that there are no jobs. and two, i really do maintain that drug penalties are the main problem and without them we would see a major sea change that wouldn't require trying to change people's minds through preaching. >> governor? governor then the next question. >> sometimes these notions get their own lives and the evidence is not there to back it up. but with regard to the last point, not only is there evidence, but i was part of

that. because if you were in state legislatures in the 1980s, which i was, when juon judiciary committees, which i was, and i remember to this day the debates about increasing predicate offenses to get more kids waived into adult court that used to be juvenile offenses because we're going to get tough on crime we're going to have a war on drugs. and as we know, some of those kids were saveable, and some of those kids we lost. because we put them in adult prison. it is just a fact. it's just a fact. and so we learned hopefully. but we still feel some consequences, some repercussions from that mindset. and i remember to this day those debates. and i'm sure the debate we had in the maryland general assembly was replicated in legislatures across the country. >> ma'am, your question. you. yes.

. >> hi. lee bose with america works. the women don't want these men involved in their children's lives. for years we were counseling the men who were not paying child support about involvement with their children. they repeatedly said they wanted to be involved. but that their mothers of the children were keeping them back. i think that's something nobody addresses. they feel that these are not reputable people, the men that they fathered the children with. they don't want their children exposed to these men. so i think it is naive to think that it is just on the man's part. it really isn't. >> i didn't hear a question so i'll hear one from you, sir. >> my name's richard foster, retired director of the newseum. i will make a couple of quick points because i know you want to keep it moving. >> i will keep it going. >> i don't think you can police

your way out of this problem anymore with further incarceration. number two, i have some issues with legalization. maybe regulation or red light district or something like that where it's controlled and not -- >> hamsterdam. >> yes legalizing numbers may have not eliminated it but it has reduced it. you, judge, will probably know there are no more bumpy johnsons running around because the employment opportunities in the numbers trade have been reduced by legalization and the lottery. so the question i would ask is is there something in between what i'm hearing in the polarized -- in other words more policing, more incarceration, or legalization. >> we'll start with the governor. >> you can have both. you can have -- i guess you can have broken windows and you can have a real debate about drug liberalization. they're not mutually exclusive.

>> lethheather. >> yeah. you know i'm well aware of the dilemma of somebody who's still on the fence about legalization because i can come back to john and say, by not enforcing drug laws, again, you are ignoring those voices in the community who say, i am threatened by the dealers. and i also don't want kids smoking dope in public because that's also an assault on public order. but i know the very persuasive response of john which is that but the only reason that this is a threat is because it's illegal. and it's -- it carries with it the aura of violence precisely because it has been driven underground. so remove that, it will -- the

threat will go away. i'd want to just add some statistics. john is right about the drug proportions in federal prisons being about half. but federal prisons are only 12% of the state -- of the national prison population. the vast majority of prisoners are in state prisons. 88%. and there the increase in incarceration for the last two decades or so has been overwhelmingly from violent and property crime. drugs offenders are about 20% of the state prison population. and the other fact is as the governor experienced, the push to increase drug penalties came predominantly from the congressional black caucus, as least with regards to crack,

because of the public health problem that the governor mentioned. rangel, major owens they said this is the worst servitude since slavery, what crack is doing to our community. so this becomes simply an empirical or medical problem of do you get more or less drug use by criminalizing or decriminalizing. but we should be clear that more addiction is not a good thing for our society. so then it becomes really again, an empirical question of how do you get less people using drugs. >> john? >> heather, we're close on this. and so close that i want to respond. state prison figures, as far as i know, are 35% are in either for drug offenses or having done something where they say that they did it because they wanted to buy some drugs.

then as far as property crimes go, the question becomes why do we have reason to believe that the property crimes were committed. in a number of those cases, it is highly likely that the person did not have a job. and then you ask, well, why did this person not have a job and why is that joblessness so epidemic in these communities. and the answer from one segment is, well, there are no jobs available. but you and i both know that is not what it is. so what creates a culture where it is a norm to not go get a job after 12th grade. once again i think that that norm is largely driven by the fact that in those communities there is this optional black market, which leads me to think that if you took that away you would have, in effect probably disproportionate to the exact figures that we're talking about, although i know i'm getting into muddier water in this case. otherwise, i -- >> i don't agree somebody's going to go work for mcdonald's

who's not inclined to do so. i think that is a problem of values and the willingness to work in a job that requires promptness, showing up every day, not bitching at your boss when he exercises authority. and this, again gets back to the family because these boys are not used to -- they do not have -- have not understood self-control and authority from having a father at home. >> hang on. you play be seated, sir if you wish. >> thank you. a statement, then a question. nobody is in federal prison for possession of drugs. simply possession. i've never seen a case like that. i've got about 25 years experience in the federal system. possession with intent to sell? yes. based on volume or purity or both. if somebody's got a carload of

drugs, then they're not -- they don't have that carload for personal use. question for john. let's assume that we legalize. what happens to the users? and do you think that they're going to get jobs? if not who is going to provide the subsidy for them to live throughout their lives in a bright blue haze? >> this is important. there is evidence that if we had the kind of legalization i'm talking about, there would be an uptick in addiction. i have talked with mark kliman about this repeatedly actually. and it is hard to imagine that that would not happen. and you know what? the race situation in this country is at such an intractable standstill we're just going around and around in circles. no offense intended but we're having the same simposia. it goes on and on and on.

i honestly think that uptick in addiction and all of its ills could be classified as collateral damage if it had the effect i'm talking about. i'm about to do an essay. i believe there are three thing america's needs to do where we have to allow certain kind of collateral damage. i also think, because incentive works, if that were the case and it were visible, then there would be more research done getting people off drugs in effective ways because we don't have any magic bullets at this point, and it is partly because not enough research goes flu it. but openly certainly addiction would go up but if we could stop this, this debate that we're having, this sense in the black community that there is no hope, the general idea that institutional racism keeps a group from performing, which i think is not true. solving all of this might require that uptick in addiction. i openly say that we should tolerate it. >> one more question here. >> bob woodson, center for neighborhood enterprise.

>> you may remain seated, as well. >> thank you, judge. do i what judges tell me. >> i like that. by the way, as a child of the '60s, but the fraphrase is purple haze. my generation. what can you do. go ahead sir. >> what we've heard thus far, just a combination of incentives and sanctions. we haven't talked about what is the role of institutions within those communities. we saw in the streets of baltimore good samaritans pouring into the streets cooking food for the police officers. we saw men with 300 on their intervening in the young people. so there are elements within those communities mediating institutions there that have the respect and control of young people. and there are examples that i can give where gang violence has been dramatically reduced by empowering those healing agents that are within communities. but we don't seem to discuss those intermediary institutions.

we just talk about it as if people are only influences by incentives and sanctions. there are cultural value elements there. why don't we ever talk about those? >> that's a really good point. i'll name two. pastors and coaches. maybe not in that order. because the latter controls playing time and team. and things that are important. and that is not a race. that is a youth observation. and race has nothing to do with that. and you saw the pastors coming together the other night. and some of these communities, they are more powerful than any politician, that's for sure. >> one more comment. sir. you. >> i have a question about policing. when i was a student in los

angeles, i remember asking a cop if he knew about the rodney king beatings and if he had been trained about it. he had no idea what i was talking about. never heard of rodney king. and then i heard an interview with an older resident of baltimore who said he missed the time when the beat cop was walking the neighborhood and knew the families, knew who your mom was, if you messed up he'd go talk to her. what is your sense of police engagement in the communities their presence in the communities and their acceptance there and knowing the people in those communities. >> we have the expert here. >> actually, this is a question that i hear all the time. especially in inner city residential. we used to know our beat cop. i actually have an answer where that beat cop went. because the initial replacement for the walking the beat was the radio car.

and the idea that we were going to measure police efficiency by how quickly they got to 911 calls. that philosophy has been largely discredited. and now we measure outcomes. the police measure their success by how much crime has dropped rather than by how many arrests are made or how quickly they got to a call. so i'm not -- i'm not sure. there are people in new york at least, officers walking the streets. and they, of course, were criticized for engaging in too many proactive stops. the whole issue of stop, question and frisk. obviously the more that you can know the community the better. i actually still don't know if that is truly not the case anymore, and if it's not the

case, why it's not happening. but obviously that is an important fact. i was in louisiana recently and the woman who drove me to the new orleans airport actually said she loves the cops. and she, amazingly, particularly loves white cops. because "those i can really speak to. . "but the reason she loved the cops is because they came to your school when she was growing up and said we're your friends, and please come to us when you need help." my view is, boy it's that easy! let's do it. it probably is not. but the more interactions we have i'm a big supporter of the explorers program to get kids into precincts to see how policing works from the other side. >> one thing i would like to explore is how i could stop the clock here and give us the time

that we need to fully explore this with this extraordinary panel who have been gracious, and you, who have been incredibly patient and kind and knowledgeable. i thank you for that. and i turn to our uber moderator for comments. >> coming up next, a discussion on educational changes to benefit the african-american community. among the topics, school choice. the influence of teachers unions, giving schools autonomy and providing social and emotional development. among the speakers washington, d.c. public school's chancellor kia henderson. and former national urban league president hugh price. >> next panel is titled "a path forward on education reform." and it will be moderated by hugh

price, neighbor of mine in westchester county new york and and non-resident senior fellow at the brookings institution where his focus is education, equal opportunity, civil rights and urban affairs. from 1994 until 2003, mr. price was -- served as president and chief executive of the national urban league. the oldest, largest community-based movement empowering blacks. to enter the economic and social mainstream. that's also where i first met mr. price as a young journalist for the "wall street journal." he gave me a nice interview and i was able to turn it into a nice piece which i guess he liked because he showed up today. mr. price has served as vice president of the rockefeller foundation where he oversaw domestic investments to improve education for at-risk youth. he is also the author of a number of books on education.

craig frisbee is an associate professor at the college of education at the university of missouri. his specializations are curriculum based assessment. he's also the author of the textbook "meeting the psycho-educational needs of minority students. evidence-based guidelines for school psychologists and other school personnel." also joining us, i think -- okay. we'll go with who's here. joining us also on the panel, kevin chavis, executive counsel for the american med ration for children -- federation for children and the alliance for school chaseoice. he's one of the nation's leading education reformers who i've had

privilege to know and use as a source over the years for my journalism. former member of the city council in the district of columbia and also is author of a number of books related to educational issues. so i will turn things over to mr. price, and thank you all. >> thank you jason. if you don't mind i'll stay put. we'll do the panel from here. it's a pleasure to be here, to be back at the national press clutch and to be back in washington. it's interesting, i live in new york and i come to washington where words like left, right liberal, conservative, pop into the conversation. living in new york we don't speak that language quite as often as we do here. three decades ago -- actually just over three decades ago, a provocative report was issued titled "a nation at risk." and it was kind of scathing assessment of the state of

public education in this country. and that report triggered an avalanche of reform that engulfs public schools to this day. reforms were imposed and in between. they were imposed consecutively concurrently and occasionally at cross purposes. we're familiar with the buzz words no child left behind, common core, high stakes tests. state takeover and merit pay, school choice and vouchers charter schools small schools, schools within schools. race to the top. school turn around. and on and on it goes. i tend to look at these policies and where we need to go from here through the prism of what's in the best interest of children who are perpetually left behind. and if you look at it from that angle, we've made some heartening progress in this country in public education, the achievement gaps between white and black students have closed

according to the national assessment of educational progress, which is basically the nation's report card. high school graduation rates are steadily climbing. we've seen impressive results, particularly in new york city with small public schools, which have achieved significant academic gains. not so much nationwide, but certainly in new york city. we've seen through the assessments of charter schools that urban charter schools tend to outperform comparable schools in the system and serve young people well according to a study by an organization. based at stanford university. yet, the reality is that far too many young people and especially black young people remain left behind. the academic gains for 17-year-olds have stagnated over a lengthy time span with the exception of 13-year-old hispanic youngsters who continue to gain in math. lt the achievement gaps in reading and math that plague black youngsters have barely

budged since the year 2008. as recently as 2013 50% of black youngsters in the fourth grade scored below basic in reading. according to the national assessment of educational progress. just by way of example. achievement gap between poor and rich kids has widened significantly and twice the black/white gap. minority students including black students continue to be disproportionately disciplined, suspended and held back in grade. the current pace of progress it would take nearly 50 years for black males to secure the same graduation rates at the white male peers. the progress is so sluggish that earlier this year the foundation

suspended the award to the urban district that makes the greatest progress because they aren't seeing a sufficient amount of progress now. it's barely on the radar screen. this is not a fuzzy, feel good concept. we know from brain research that it is essential for learning, achieving and succeeding. it entails successful management of critical life tasks like learning, forming of relationships, control of impulseivity, and so forth. we also know that employers value social and emotional competence enormously. students who struggle in school often lack the social and emotional skills that are needed to succeed academically. we know ideally that parents should attend to the development of their children.

that churches and the kind of organizations spoke to should, as well. the question is, what if they don't? or what if there aren't enough such services to help the children who have needs. when they don't have the social and emotional development they need. they don't pay attention in class, they're not focused on learning, act out interact poorly with their teachers and classmates. they skip class and skip school. we also know they're more likely to exhibit the academic indifference and behavioral difficulties associated with social and emotional deficits. research indicate that interventions focused on fortifying youngsters social and emotional skills help improve their academic performance in the behavior. a recent study by the teachers college showed that investing in social, emotional development yields measurable benefits that far exceed their costs that for

every dollar invested, there's a return of $11 economically. under pressure to improve test scores. youngsters nonacademic needs. this has led me to believe that we need a new paradigm. we need schools that are devoted to the academic and social development of youngsters as a co-equal mission. and that this mission should drive the curriculum, the staffing, the structure and the means of assessment in these schools. ironically, social and emotional development is common place in parochial schools, private schools and boarding schools, but not in america's public schools and especially not in those who serve minority and low-income children who typically are left behind. and that is why i'm of the very strong view that social and emotional development is the next frontier in school reform.

jason, thank you for giving me a few minutes to say my piece. and let me turn it over to -- who wants to go first? go to my left? okay. >> good morning, everyone. >> morning. >> i'd like to start off with a quote. that captures the spirit of this education panel. that quote is from frederick douglas where he states it's easier to build strong children than it is to fix broken adults. and in that spirit, i'd like to say that as i understand the purpose of this panel, we're here to celebrate some of the positive developments in black education that have occurred since the moynihan report. at the same time, we need to honestly discuss some of the challenges

in minnesota. and since that time, i understand we have a little over 6,000 charter schools in operation today. so there's a lot to celebrate. but at the same time, there is unevenness from state to state with respect to the strength of charter school laws. some states have charter school laws that don't allow for sufficient autonomy in charter

schools. other states have very strong laws. we have unevenness from state to state in terms of funding for giving minority parents choice. as to where they want their children to be educated. i understand there was a recent cause to celebrate in the state of arizona where the governor there had provided funding for native american parents to have greater school choice. so that's certainly something to celebrate. but we still have problems. we have problems with authorizers of charter schools many authorizers don't like charter schools. they're not selective in handing out charters. and they they won't shut down bad schools. we have unevenness from state to state with respect to alternative certification standards for teachers. there was a time when if you were a -- a very bright graduate

of a particular discipline but you didn't want to go through an education school, you could pursue an alternative certification route that would allow you to teach in some of our nation's more troubled schools. and now there has been some issues with alternative certification systems not being up to the same quality that they were years ago. and, of course we have the problem of hostile teachers unions who tend to resist charter schools. so that has always been an issue. at the city level, we have issues, as well. how many people here are from the city of new york. anyone here from new york? okay. sizable number. the mayor that you would have would make a strong difference

in terms of being open to charter school development. and from what i hear from people who live in new york the saying is bloomberg good, de blasio bad with respect to that issue. in cities many times the success of well performing charter schools is often a function of whether or not you have well-functioning charter management organizations. whether you have leadership development programs and, of course, the kipp charter schools at the forefront of having good leadership development programs. many times we have trouble finding local funders and civic leaders. now, let's go to the school level. and at the school level, we begin to get closer to home in terms of some of the frustrations that we have with making progress.