Not a Crime to Be Poor: The Criminalization of Poverty in America

by Peter Edelman

Overview

Awarded "Special Recognition" by the 2018 Robert F. Kennedy Book & Journalism Awards

Finalist for the American Bar Association's 2018 Silver Gavel Book Award

Named one of the "10 books to read after you've read Evicted" by the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

"Essential reading for anyone trying to understand the demands of social justice in America."—Bryan Stevenson, author of Just Mercy

Winner of a special Robert F. Kennedy Book Award, the book that Evicted author Matthew Desmond calls "a powerful investigation into the ways the United States has addressed poverty . . . lucid and troubling"

In one of the richest countries on Earth it has effectively become a crime to be poor. For example, in Ferguson, Missouri, the U.S. Department of Justice didn't just expose racially biased policing; it also exposed exorbitant fines and fees for minor crimes that mainly hit the city's poor, African American population, resulting in jail by the thousands. As Peter Edelman explains in Not a Crime to Be Poor, in fact Ferguson is everywhere: the debtors' prisons of the twenty-first century. The anti-tax revolution that began with the Reagan era led state and local governments, starved for revenues, to squeeze ordinary people, collect fines and fees to the tune of 10 million people who now owe $50 billion.

Nor is the criminalization of poverty confined to money. Schoolchildren are sent to court for playground skirmishes that previously sent them to the principal's office. Women are evicted from their homes for calling the police too often to ask for protection from domestic violence. The homeless are arrested for sleeping in the park or urinating in public.

A former aide to Robert F. Kennedy and senior official in the Clinton administration, Peter Edelman has devoted his life to understanding the causes of poverty. As Harvard Law professor Randall Kennedy has said, "No one has been more committed to struggles against impoverishment and its cruel consequences than Peter Edelman." And former New York Times columnist Bob Herbert writes, "If there is one essential book on the great tragedy of poverty and inequality in America, this is it."

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781620971635
Publisher:	New Press, The
Publication date:	10/31/2017
Pages:	320
Product dimensions:	5.50(w) x 8.50(h) x 1.20(d)

About the Author

Peter Edelman is the Carmack Waterhouse Professor of Law and Public Policy and the faculty director of the Center on Poverty and Inequality at Georgetown UniversityLaw Center. Edelman was a top advisor to Senator Robert F. Kennedy and served in President Bill Clinton’s administration. He is the author of So Rich, So Poor (The New Press) and lives in Washington, D.C.

Table of Contents

Introduction xi

Part 1 The Criminalization of Poverty

1 Ferguson Is Everywhere: Twenty-First-Century Debtors' Prisons 3

2 Fighting Back: The Advocates and Their Work 21

3 Money Bail 45

4 The Criminalization of Mental Illness 63

5 Child Support: Criminalizing Poor Fathers 83

6 Criminalizing Public Benefits 91

7 Poverty, Race, and Discipline in Schools: Go Directly to Jail 117

8 Crime-Free Housing Ordinances and the Criminalization of Homelessness 135

Part 2 Ending Poverty

9 Taking Criminal Justice Reform Seriously 159

10 Turning the Coin Over: Ending Poverty as We Know It 183

Aftenwrd 251

Acknowledgments 261

Notes 265

Index 289

Editorial Reviews

2017-08-06
How poor people are being punished for their poverty.Supported by compelling evidence of endemic injustice, Edelman (Law and Public Policy/Georgetown Univ. Law Center; So Rich, So Poor: Why It's So Hard to End Poverty in America, 2012, etc.), faculty director of Georgetown's Center on Poverty and Inequality, presents a hard-hitting argument for reform. Joining critiques offered by writers such as Chris Hayes (A Colony in a Nation), Michelle Alexander (The New Jim Crow), and Matthew Desmond (Evicted), Edelman underscores the ways in which impoverished individuals are victimized by the criminal justice system. "Low income people are arrested for minor violations that are only annoyances for people with means," he writes, and they face penalties they cannot afford to pay. Failure to pay results in additional fines, repeated driver's license suspensions, and incarceration. Shockingly, 43 states charge for having a public defender. In addition, to accrue revenue, states have increased fines for minor infractions. Fines for speeding tickets have soared to $300 or more. Students who commit low-level offenses often are sent into the criminal system rather than to the principal's office. To monitor probation, 13 states employ for-profit companies that impose high fees, and 44 states charge offenders for the costs of their own probation or parole, which include fees for electronic bracelets, drug testing, alcohol monitoring, driving classes, and home supervision. Mentally ill inmates receive no treatment or at best minimal attention; Edelman cites Corizon, "the largest for-profit mental health provider in the country for prisons, jails and detention centers," as particularly egregious. After documenting case after shocking case in the first part of the book, Edelman proposes that the real solution to injustice lies in ending poverty: "prenatal care for all, child development for all children, first-class education for all, decent jobs and effective work supports, affordable housing, health and mental health, lawyers as needed, safe neighborhoods," healthy communities, and "social, racial and gender justice." He presents case histories of achievements in several communities, fueling his optimism. An impassioned call for an "overarching movement" for justice.

Kirkus Reviews

Praise for Not a Crime to Be Poor:
Awarded “Special Recognition” by the 2018 Robert F. Kennedy Book & Journalism Awards

Finalist for the American Bar Association’s 2018 Silver Gavel Book Award

Named one of the “10 books to read after you've read Evicted” by the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

Named one of the “Top 50 hardcover nonfiction titles for 2017” by the Boswell and Books

“[Not a Crime to Be Poor is] a powerful investigation into the ways the United States has addressed poverty. . . . Lucid and troubling.”
—Matthew Desmond, author of Evicted, in The Chronicle of Higher Education

"A hard-hitting argument for reform. . . . An impassioned call for an ‘overarching movement’ for justice."
—Kirkus Reviews

“This compelling, insightful examination of how we demonize the poor and sustain poverty through our misguided policies is essential reading for anyone trying to understand the demands of social justice in America. Sharp, critical analysis of an issue too frequently ignored.”
—Bryan Stevenson, author of Just Mercy

“An extraordinary exposé of the criminalization of poverty, a vivid explanation of its many guises, and an inspiring call and guide to reform. Over the past half century no one has been more committed to struggles against impoverishment and its cruel consequences than Peter Edelman. Not a Crime to Be Poor is another chapter in his admirable career.”
—Randall Kennedy, professor, Harvard Law School

“A comprehensive, readable, and shocking examination of the criminalization of poverty, and punishments that consist of fines and fees the poor cannot afford and conditions they cannot meet.”
—Stephen Bright, president of the Southern Center for Human Rights

“A chilling exposé of how America's courts, once bastions of justice, now routinely degrade themselves, and the nation, by ruthlessly extracting resources from our nation's most vulnerable citizens, rendering it a crime to be too poor to pay. It also names names—both the names of the villains who chose to exploit the poor and the heroes who fight back. Please read this book.”
—Kathryn Edin, co-author of $2.00 a Day: Living on Almost Nothing in America

“The intersection of race, poverty and the criminal justice system is compellingly examined in Peter Edelman's new book, Not a Crime to Be Poor. It should be required reading for all those who seek equal justice in our nation.”
—Judge Jonathan Lippman, former chief judge of the New York Court of Appeals


Praise for Peter Edelman’s So Rich, So Poor:
"Peter Edelman brings blinding lucidity to a subject usually mired in prejudice and false preconceptions."
—Barbara Ehrenreich

"If there is one essential book on the great tragedy of poverty and inequality in America, this is it. Peter Edelman is masterful on the issue. With a real-world grasp of politics and the economy, Edelman makes a brilliantly compelling case for what can and must be done."
—Bob Herbert

"A competent, thorough assessment from a veteran expert in the field."
—Kirkus Reviews

From the Publisher

This audiobook tackles the uncomfortable notion that our criminal justice system treats the poor terribly, if not criminally. Through fines, an unjust bail system, and a jail system that sometimes substitutes for a mental health facility, the author argues, being poor is now akin to being a lawbreaker. Narrator Eric G. Dove has a deep, authoritative voice, and he succeeds in establishing the serious and informational tone this book deserves. He approaches the work with an unadorned style, but he doesn’t vary his performance enough to move beyond the text, and at times he doesn’t pause enough to let us contemplate the author’s words. Dove does a serviceable job with an audiobook that should be widely read and discussed. R.I.G. © AudioFile 2017, Portland, Maine

DECEMBER 2017 - AudioFile