Letter: Benefits for Drug Felons

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Sadly, some states continue to deny social welfare benefits to impoverished citizens with drug felony convictions ("Unfair Punishments," editorial, March 17). But a majority of states restore such benefits to drug felons, including food stamps.

This is a welcome surprise. Their actions give us hope that the "punitive turn" penologists observed the United States make over the last four decades is reversible. I recently conducted a peer-reviewed study on the trend.

As for states that continue to follow the federal government's preference for banning aid to drug felons — but not to poor rapists, robbers and murderers — they tend to cling to correctional cultures of retribution and degradation.

They also tend to treat all felons badly after their convictions, diminishing the rights and benefits of citizenship in other areas (voting and licensing).

Exploding correctional costs and the connection between bad policies and criminal behavior, however, will likely reverse their courses, too.

MICHAEL LEO OWENS
Atlanta, March 20, 2013

The writer is an associate professor of political science at Emory University.

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