New York Yearly Meeting Committee for Criminal Justice: Testimony on Restorative Justice

This position paper is frames as a testimony - as such it states that the writers feel compelled by the Holy Spirit to testify to the strength of restorative justice, as opposed to the current system of retributive justice.

The writers accept that retributive justice, with its focus on punishment, is attractive. When a person has been wronged it is natural for them to feel rage and anger, and desire to punish the offender. Further, they accept that many times, punishment is seen as a last resort, a method to turn to when other negotiation has failed. However, they urge their audience to learn "to live without violence."

Restorative justice frames offenses as conflict that occurs between two individuals, however, the agents involved are the victim, the offender, and also society. The responsibility of the system, then, is to heal the wounds inflicted on each of these agents by the offense. The Committee for Criminal Justice thus goes through their paper exploring, one by one, the role each of these agents play in a the "lengthy process of healing" that is restorative justice.

The offender is responsible for acknowledging their own responsibility, making some form of restitution, expressing regret, removing the causes in her life for crime, and finally, giving evidence of improvement.

The victim must examine her feelings regarding the event, express these feelings through her support network, especially remembering that feelings are not actions, and thus cannot be evil or harmful, reject retributive action, cooperate in the restorative justice process, and finally, to "decide not to act on anger."

The writers acknowledge that some victims, as well as some offenders, may choose not to participate in the process. The system must make room for these people, offering them continued support for their healing.

As such, society too has a role to play in the process. Primarily, it must protect the victim and offender from further harm or acts of vengeance. Also, it must support the restorative justice process, which means footing the bill and otherwise creating an environment in which it can occur.

The paper closes with a strong claim: that "THERE IS NO BENEFIT OF OUR PRESENT SYSTEM OF JUSTICE WHICH IS NOT ALSO A BENIFIT OF A NON-PUNITIVE, RESTORATIVE SYSTEM" (caps from original). Emphasizing that our present system is expensive and does little to actually reduce crime, the writers accept that a change in system will be difficult, even costly, however, its ultimate benefits will serve as a vast improvement to society.

As we discussed, this would fit really nicely into a section on alternative justice methods, specifically the couple of Quaker ones I found at FHL. The more I read these documents, the more I think maybe they would fit in at the beginning of the course - an interesting framework from which to look at the case studies, which would come later.

We had also talked about putting one of the case studies at the beginning of the course. I don't know how those two would work together. I am going to be looking at the syllabus after I finish going through the FHL documents and the last dredges of the syllabus that I have been putting off. I'm not sure if that will happen before our Wednesday meeting (at noon! just a reminder for myself) but we'll see.