The privatization movement is but the latest manifestation of the degree to which the moral and practical value of the corrections commissioner's work has been called into question. In the 1960s the commissioners heard shouts of "Tear down the walls"; in the 1980s the shouts became "Sell them!" Over the last two decades, liberals have argued that correctional institutions and programs are unjust and inhumane; conservatives have claimed that they cost too much and punish too little. In the eyes of the former, commissioners who plead that corrections can be improved through better public management are guilty of arguing that the guillotine can work better if it is well oiled. To the latter, commissioners who operate programs designed to protect inmates and enhance their life prospects are guilty of displaying too much concern for remorseless criminals and too little for their innocent victims.
In this regard, perhaps the single best example of the impossible character of the corrections commissioner's job is the prison and jail furlough programs. A furlough is an officially sanctioned leave from confinement monitored by regular or random checks on the inmate's whereabouts and behavior. In most jurisdictions, furloughs of varied length are granted to inmates within months of their official release dates. They give the inmates a chance to reintegrate themselves back into the "free world," search for gainful post-release employment; establish contacts with family members who will be vital to the inmate's successful return to the community, and so on.
In general, corrections officials are extremely careful in granting furloughs, and their carefulness pays off. In 1987, for example, over two hundred thousand furloughs were granted nationwide. Over 99.7 percent of them resulted in neither a technical violation of the terms of the furlough nor a new crime. According to most of the existing research on the subject, and in the judgment of virtually every seasoned corrections administrator, inmates who receive furloughs have fewer behavioral problems behind bars, lower rates of recidivism, and a better post-release employment record than comparable inmates who do not receive furloughs, or who receive them less frequently.
As one corrections official stated: "What other government program do you know of that works over 99 percent of the time? What other corrections program is there that comes after a long bout of punishment, clearly helps rehabilitate some offenders, gives the inmates a real incentive to stay out of trouble inside and in the community, and poses very little risk to public safety?" He might have added "saves money" and "relieves institutional overcrowding" to this list: A day of furlough supervision costs a fraction of a day of confinement supervision, and furlough programs free up a little space in packed prisons and jails.
Nevertheless, corrections commissioners who tout their furlough program as an example of a cost-effective correctional management strategy with clear net benefits, both human and financial, are setting themselves up for a sure fall. This was illustrated clearly in the wake of the 1988 presidential race. Willie Horton, a Massachusetts inmate serving a sentence of life without the possibility of parole, was granted an unsupervised parole. While on furlough, Horton beat and raped a Maryland woman and assaulted her husband. In famous (or infamous) campaign ads, the Democratic presidential candidate, Massachusetts Governor Michael Dukakis, was blamed for the Horton incident and the "revolving-door justice" it supposedly exemplified. The Democrats struck back, albeit ineffectively, by publicizing the fact that during his tenure as governor of California, Ronald Reagan had "authorized" two furloughs that resulted in violent crimes, including one against a law enforcement officer.
Regardless of what effect the "furlough issue" had on the 1988 presidential race, its impact on furlough programs around the country were felt almost immediately: retrenchment in most jurisdictions, de facto abolition in others. North Carolina and Massachusetts were the only two states that granted furloughs to inmates serving sentences of life without possibility of parole; both states have removed those inmates' eligibility for furloughs. Despite their relatively liberal eligibility standards, Massachusetts and North Carolina had two of the nation's most successful furlough programs. But in Massachusetts, North Carolina, New Jersey, New Mexico, Maryland, California, Michigan, and many other states, the Horton incident had a chilling effect on prison and jail administration, and the percentage of furlough-eligible inmates granted furloughs declined from pre-1988 levels, in some cases to zero.
At the federal level, the Bureau of Prisons (BOP) boasted what was arguably the nation's most successful and tightly administered furlough program. To honor a Bush campaign promise, however, in August 1989 the BOP was formally directed by the attorney general to further tighten furlough eligibility requirements and to reduce the number of inmates being granted furloughs; in fact, well before this formal directive had been issued, the BOP had cut back on furloughs.
Upon hearing the news of the Bush administration's decision to curtail furloughs in the BOP, one former state corrections commissioner observed: "There it is, there's the impossible nature of this job. You run a program that's a success by any rational criterion. . . . Does a welfare director get pressured or axed if one AFDC [Aid to Families with Dependent Children] recipient fails to leave the welfare rolls after going through a welfare reform job-readiness program? Of course not. But in corrections, one Willie Horton can derail a good program nationally and ruin a career." In fact, Massachusetts Corrections Commissioner Michael Fair resigned under pressure after the 1988 presidential election; by most accounts, Fair, who had served longer than his two immediate predecessors, was the state's best corrections commissioner since Sanford Bates.
Thus, surrounded and hounded by his or her agency's coaches, customers, and critics, the contemporary corrections commissioner manages a growing corner of the American criminal justice "non-system"-an exceedingly loose confederation of federal, state, and local courts, district attorneys' offices, police departments, and other bureaucracies, numbering in the thousands and operating under a mind-boggling array of administrative, legal, and political constraints. Like their cousins in policing, mental health, and certain other areas, executives of barbed-wire bureaucracies have ways of coping with the multiple, vague, and contradictory goals, with the fragmented and often fractured bureaucratic authority, with the uncertainty about how to achieve correctional ends, and with the non-voluntary and often incorrigible character of their clients that define their impossible job.
