Leaders at both ends of the political spectrum see a need for commonsense reform.

Conservatives argue for a smarter, less costly criminal justice approach focused on community based solutions. The Conservative Case for Reform is a project of the Texas Policy Foundation in cooperation with the Justice Fellowship. It is focused on fighting crime, prioritizing victims and protecting taxpayers.

Grover Norquist, President, Americans for Tax Reform said, “Misbehavior that leads to disruption in the classroom does not warrant a $500 Class C misdemeanor ticket and subsequent trip to municipal court. An after-school detention or two, for example, should do the trick just fine, without great cost to the taxpayers or overburdening our courts.” Rand Paul, U.S. Senator from Kentucky, said, “Our federal mandatory minimum sentences are simply heavy handed and arbitrary. They can affect anyone at any time, though they disproportionately affect those without the means to fight them. We should stand and loudly proclaim enough is enough. We should not have laws that ruin the lives of young men and women who have committed no violence.”

To see what other conservatives are saying

An indication that reducing over criminalization and safely lowering criminal justice costs are neither conservative nor liberal ideas, is commentary by The Washington Post’s E.J. Dionne

Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals Judge Neil Gorsuch’s remarks at the Federalist Society’s National Lawyers Convention in Washington, DC.