Ruiz V. Estelle: A Study Research Paper

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Building more prisons (only 15 of the 112 current Texas prisons are private) cost the taxpayers money, money that, given the current economic climate is begrudgingly spent. Indeed, Dick J. Reavis, of the Texas Monthly, believes that the prisons of 20 years ago were much more cost-effective, and also much more effective in their job of rehabilitation, than prisons who now operate under the guidance of the PLRA (Prison Litigation Reform Act) signed into law by President Clinton in 1995. He states the previous prison system: "was a more efficient but no less ugly system because things were that way. Texas prisons were places where, in defiance of law, prisoners were punished by assault, by kicks and blows from guards and their convict allies, the building tenders. Men were thrown into darkened cells and kept incommunicado and wasting away on a diet of bread and water." (Texas Monthly) Was this effective at keeping the peace? Reavis think so, as do many of the old guard. The old system certainly seems to address three of the four theories of why we incarcerate criminals: Refrain (keeping criminals from committing more crime), Restraint (keeping criminals away from the general public), and Retribution (making criminals pay for what they did). But what about the fourth "R" -- Rehabilitation? Is it possible for a criminal to be rehabilitated in such an environment? Or was retribution more, as "Red" says in The Shawshank Redemption, "Rehabilitation? It's just a bullshit word. So go ahead and stamp your forms, sonny, and stop wasting my time." Most criminals, Ruiz included, came from horrific backgrounds -- will more horror serve to set them straight when to them, it is just more of the same? That seems dubious psychology and theory at best, justification of torture at worst.

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Certainly, the relatives of David Resendez Ruiz would believe that the latter -- rehabilitation -- is every bit as important as the former "R's" of refrain, restraint and retribution. According to Ruiz' daughter, Eva, "To me, because of his lawsuit, he has made history. He felt that everyone should be treated humanely, even though they made a mistake. To me, my dad gave his life for the prisoners." (Workers World)

Everyone should be treated humanely. Is that what the Founding Fathers meant when they penned the Eighth Amendment? While none of us can stand in their shoes and say that we definitively know just what they meant when they wrote the Constitution of the United States, along with the Bill of Rights, given the fact that in the eyes of the British, our Founding Fathers were criminals themselves for defying the throne, we can make an educated guess that they'd chose treating everyone, even those convicted of crimes, humanely. We can go farther, and think of the freedoms we hold so dear that we ow to them. Surely, those who commit crimes lose their rights to their freedom -- but does that mean they lose their right to be treated as human beings? I don't think so, and David Resendez Ruiz didn't think so, either. Though the Ruiz v Estelle decision has met with its fair share of controversy, that controversy reveals a fundamental conflict in the American consciousness, that between the need to punish those who do harm, and the need to treat all people, even the most vile, with a modicum of humanity. To do the former may give us the vengeance we seek, but to do the latter may lead to our own redemption, as well as that of those we.....

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