Panelists will include Law School professor Michael Smith and three other specialists in the field of sentencing (see biographical information below). Introducing the panel will be the Hon. Robert Kastenmeier, the former Wisconsin Congressman whose longtime record of public service is honored each year by this colloquium.
2001 COLLOQUIUM BACKGROUND:
Starting in the mid-1970s there has been an ongoing debate in the legislatures and courts, as well as among scholars of criminal justice, about what would be an appropriate way to guide judges in the sentencing of criminals. The Sentencing Reform Act of 1984 significantly changed federal sentencing practices. Until the guidelines took effect, a federal judge was free to impose any sentence deemed appropriate, up to the statutory maximum. For sentences of more than a year, however, the actual length of time served was determined by the U.S. Parole Commission. The Sentencing Reform Act abolished parole and made the judge the determiner of the length of time served. The Act, however, also restricted the judge's discretion, requiring the judge to impose a sentence called for by sentencing guidelines, unless there were extraordinary circumstances. A Presidentially-appointed, Senate-confirmed U.S. Sentencing Commission was set up to promulgate guidelines, and those guidelines restrict sentencing courts to narrow sentencing ranges.
There have been many complaints about the sentencing system established by the Sentencing Reform Act of 1984. Professor Kate Stith of Harvard Law School and Judge Jose Cabranes have written a book (Fear of Judging) arguing that the system deprives judges of necessary discretion. They do not recommend discarding the system but offer several proposals to increase judicial discretion. Judges and defense attorneys have complained that the guidelines have resulted in greater, unguided power for the prosecutor. Others, in practice and in the academy, complain that the guidelines are too mechanical and overly complex. The defense bar and prison reformers criticize the severity of the guidelines. Prosecutors have not complained about the fundamentals of the sentencing system; their complaints generally have been about the lack of severity of the punishment called for by the guidelines, especially in white-collar cases.
Meanwhile most states have enacted various systems to guide or control sentencing of criminals. The overall question after a quarter century of guidelines practice and debate is: What have we learned?
2001 KASTENMEIER COLLOQUIUM PANELISTS:
Thomas Hutchison (Moderator) is an attorney with the Administrative Office of the United States Courts, responsible for representing the interests of the Federal Public and Community Defenders before the United States Sentencing Commission and for training attorneys who represent indigent defendants in federal court about sentencing matters. Before joining the Administrative Office of the U.S. Courts, he was counsel to the House Judiciary Committee for some 17 years. He is a member of the Practitioners? Advisory Group of the U.S. Sentencing Commission, a member of the editorial advisory board of the Federal Sentencing Reporter, and is co-author of a treatise on federal sentencing, Federal Sentencing Law and Practice. He has undergraduate and law degrees from the University of Wisconsin.
Douglas Berman is assistant professor of law at Ohio State University, where he teaches criminal law and criminal punishment and sentencing. He has an undergraduate degree from Princeton and a law degree from Harvard. After law school, he clerked for Judge Jon O. Newman and then Judge Guido Calabresi of the United States Court of Appeal for the Second Circuit. After his clerkships, he was a litigation associate at Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison. He is an editor of the Federal Sentencing Reporter and has written extensively on the sentencing matters. His most recent article is ?Balanced and Purposeful Departures Fixing a Jurisprudence that Undermines the Federal Sentencing Guidelines? in the Notre Dame Law Review.
Michael E. Smith is an assistant professor of law at the University of Wisconsin Law School, where he teaches criminal law, criminal procedure, and sentencing and corrections. Before joining the Law School in 1995, he was president and director of the Vera Institute of Justice for some 16 years. He is on the editorial advisory board of the Federal Sentencing Reporter.
John Steer is a vice chair of the United States Sentencing Commission, appointed by President Clinton in November 1999. He served as the Commission's general counsel from 1987 until his appointment. He served as legislative director for Senator Strom Thurmond (R-SC) and counsel to the Senate Judiciary Committee. He has B.S. and M.S. degrees from Clemson University and a J.D. degree from the University of South Carolina.
The Robert W. Kastenmeier Fund
This colloquium is supported by the fund established to honor Robert W. Kastenmeier, an outstanding graduate of the University of Wisconsin Law School, who served with great distinction in the United States Congress from 1958-1990. During his tenure, Congressman Kastenmeier made special contributions to the improvement of the judiciary and to the field of intellectual property law. He drafted the rules for the House Committee on the Judiciary that were used for the impeachment of President Richard M. Nixon and drafted the articles of impeachment against Judge Harry Claiborne. In 1985, Kastenmeier received the Warren E. Burger Award, presented by the Institute for Court Management, and the Service Award of the National Center for State Courts. In 1988, he was honored by the American Judicature Society with its Justice Award for his contributions to improving the administration of justice.
The Kastenmeier Fund was created to recognize these contributions by fostering important legal scholarship in the fields of intellectual property, corrections, administration of justice and civil liberties. It is a fitting tribute to the leadership of Robert W. Kastenmeier in these areas.
PREVIOUS KASTENMEIER EVENTS
2000 Colloquium -- ?From the Bill of Rights to the Internet: Protecting Privacy Rights and Interests in the New Millennium?
1999 Colloquium -- ?From Watergate to the Present: Impeachment, Presidential Accountability, and the Separation of Powers?
1997 Lecture -- Professor Paul Goldstein ?The Transformation of American Copyright Law?
1996 Lecture -- Honorable Abner J. Mikva ?Political Extremism: Is It New? Is It Worse? Is It Curable??
1995 Symposium -- ?Is Effective Crime Policy Possible??
1993-94 Symposium -- ?Computer Software Protection: Reinventing Intellectual Property?
1992 Lecture -- Honorable William H. Rehnquist ?Seen in a Glass Darkly: The Future of the Federal Courts?
Submitted by on February 7, 2001
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