Catching Up on My Colorado Columns

Notes about criminal justice, housing policy, discrimination law, anti-gay provisions in the state constitution, 'good guys with a gun,' and schools.

It has been a rough couple of months for me. June was extremely busy with family events and travel, then (because of the travel) my wife and I contracted Covid near the end of June. That hit us a lot harder than I expected; these new variants are no joke. I’ve also been working on a long paper concerning Colorado politics—stay tuned. In this post I summarize my recent columns for Complete Colorado, starting with the most recent.

‘Abolition’ in the Context of Criminal Justice

We all know what Abolition means in the context of slavery. But what do people mean by the term today regarding criminal justice? Obviously they’re trying to tie their new cause to the older one, but the link just isn’t there. In my column for Complete Colorado, I discuss some of the remarks about “abolition” by likely state legislator Elisabeth Epps. Here are a couple of key paragraphs:

Some people do bad things because, through a long string of bad choices, poor decisions, and mental evasions, they become bad people. Although various policies can help, we can’t socially engineer ourselves out of crime. Hence, we need, and always will need, police to try to stop crimes and to bring criminals to justice, courts to try people accused of crimes, and prisons to separate violent people from the rest of society. We cannot abolish those things without inviting chaos, and if we try we will create vigilantism, cycles of revenge violence, and pervasive gang warfare.

What we can do is work to reform the criminal justice system such that police consistently act to protect rather than violate people’s rights, courts treat people accused of crimes justly and compassionately, and prisons treat people humanely and help to rehabilitate criminals rather than abuse them and school them in criminality. The best ideas for such reforms are coming from libertarians—see philosopher Michael Huemer’s book Justice before the Law—and from leftists such as Epps. So I’m hoping to see interesting alliances and progress in these areas.

Read the entire piece.

Government Controls Restrict Housing

In my article, “Housing solutions require fewer government controls,” I argue:

The fundamental problem with sky-high housing costs is that government restricts the construction of housing and restricts how people may use their housing, as through occupancy limits. The fundamental solution, then, is for government to stop doing those things. When I say I support YIMBY—Yes In My Back Yard policies—I mean we should leave people free to develop and use their property according to their own judgment, consistent with the rights of others. . . .

Rent control discourages property owners from supplying new housing, discourages the upkeep of existing housing, discourages the economic use of housing, and pushes up prices of non-controlled housing.

Read the entire piece.

In related news . . . “About a hundred people gathered at the west side steps of the State Capitol” July 10 for a “Colorado Homes for All rally, calling on state leaders to repeal the 1981 ban on rent stabilization,” reports 7News (in a completely uncritical, cheer-leading piece masquerading as a news article).

Also, Trevor Burrus hosts an excellent Free Thoughts podcast episode with M. Nolan Gray on zoning in the U.S.

Compelled Speech and Discrimination Law

In my column, “Colorado still violating rights with compelled speech,” I argue that Colorado businesses should not be forced, as a condition of staying in business, to create things that explicitly or symbolically express views with which they disagree. I argue:

[The] customer-product distinction is important. Let’s say a bakery had some pre-made generic wedding cakes on the rack, and two couples came in, one straight, one gay. If the bakery refused to sell a pre-made cake to the gay couple but sold the exact same cake to the straight couple, that obviously would be discriminatory. Unless you think anti-discrimination law should be totally thrown out—and hardly anyone thinks that—then you’ll have to allow that government properly may outlaw such discrimination.

But then let’s say the straight couple said, “Your pre-made cakes look nice, but we want a custom cake for our wedding next week. We want a little statue of a man and a woman, and we want the cake to say, ‘Congratulations Joe and Sally.'” The gay couple said something similar, but asked for a little statue of two women and wanted their cake to say “Congratulations Sue and Sally.” Let’s say the bakery accepted the first order but refused the second.

I want to say that people have an absolute right to control the content of the works they create (subject to contractual obligations). I think that is required by the First Amendment and by the right to free speech.

I’ll note that someone wrote in to complain that I said “the owner of 303 Creative is a bigot and morally wrong to discriminate” by not creating web sites for gay weddings. But that really is bigotry in my view. We have to distinguish between what is morally wrong and what government properly may prohibit or require.

Read the entire piece.

Residual Anti-Gay Elements of Colorado’s Constitution

In my column, “Repeal Amendments 2 and 43 from Colorado Constitution,” I begin:

Right now the Colorado Constitution, under the Bill of Rights no less (Article II), contains two provisions intended to restrict people’s rights. Section 30b forbids government in Colorado to pass any provision protecting “homosexual, lesbian or bisexual” people from discrimination. Section 31 says, “Only a union of one man and one woman shall be valid or recognized as a marriage in this state.”

Both of those provisions straightforwardly violate aspects of the federal Constitution, including the Equal Protection clause, so courts threw them out. But they are still officially on the books. The legislature should refer measures to remove those outmoded provisions, and Colorado voters should formally repeal them.

Read the entire piece.

Armed Self-Defense

In my recent column, “Yes, good guys with a gun can stop crime,” I review some statistics published by the New York Times. I argue, “Complaining that good guys with guns do not stop bad guys with guns, in cases where most good guys are legally forbidden to carry guns, hardly is a fair criticism.”

Read the entire piece.

I also touch on this issue in my newest column, which begins:

These have been a rough couple of months for police. An investigation in Uvalde, Texas, found “systemic failures and egregious poor decision making” by the 376 law enforcement officers who delayed responding to a school shooter by 73 minutes. By comparison, in Indiana, Elisjsha Dicken, a regular person lawfully carrying a concealed handgun, single-handedly stopped a mass murderer by shooting the suspect within fifteen seconds.

Poor Results in Colorado Schools

In my column, “Colorado schools leaving many students behind,” I discuss pre-pandemic results from the National Assessment of Educational Progress. I review:

In a 2019 release, the Colorado Department of Education brags that “Colorado 4th and 8th graders continue to outperform nation.” But how good is that, really? . . .

Overall, only 40% of fourth-grade students “performed at or above proficient” levels in reading, while 44% performed that well in math. Only 71% “performed at or above basic” level in reading, while 80% performed that well in math. The numbers for eighth graders were not too different. . . .

Schools need to teach kids how to read and do math, regardless of their background. And generally we should expect students to be proficient in their subjects, not just barely competent. Obviously public schools often are not succeeding.

In related news, “The rate at which Colorado students are going to college right out of high school has dipped, and those who do go are less prepared,” Chalkbeat reports.

Read the entire piece.