Former prosecutor mixes music with criminal justice reform

Paul Butler discusses jury nullification, power of hip-hop.

By Jamie Loo, First Amendment reporter

April 8, 2010

CHICAGO—Hip hop music has lessons that can help change the criminal justice system, according to former federal prosecutor Paul Butler.

Butler talked about the messages in hip hop and jury nullification during a discussion on his book “Let’s Get Free: A Hip-Hop Theory of Justice” at the DuSable Museum last week.

Although hip hop music addresses a variety of topics and points of view, Butler said the one unifying theme is its critique of the criminal justice system. Without hip hop music, he said there isn’t another art form in popular culture that offers this analysis that reaches such a wide audience. The majority of hip hop artists are African-American men, he said, and much of their work is based on their personal experiences with the criminal justice system. The majority of prisoners in the U.S. are black men. Butler said society teaches us to be disgusted with criminals but that would mean being disgusted by this demographic.

“When a large percentage of the people who you know and love and respect get locked up then getting locked up seems more to say more about the state than it does about those young men,” he said.

Butler pointed to lyrics in rapper Jay-Z’s song “A Ballad for the Fallen Soldier” where he compares a hustler, or a criminal, to a soldier:

“This here’s a ballad for all the fallen soldiers I’ma bout ‘ta show you how a hustlers life (this is life man) and a soldier’s life, parallel And the one thing they got in common is pain (forget about me for a second) Picture split screen On one side we got a hustler getting ready for the block (human beings) Other side you got the soldier getting ready for bootcamp (soldiers) They’re both at war (this is life)”

The overall effect is that getting arrested is almost a rite of passage and prison has lost its stigma because it has become part of black culture, Butler said. Although some critics say hip hop glorifies criminals, Butler said it actually shows respect for the struggle and stigma African American men face in society and the criminal justice system. Hip hop has many songs about compassion toward young black men and the pain that is felt from their absence in the community when they go to prison. In Angie Stone’s son, “Brotha” she sings about her support for black men.

“He’s misunderstood, some say that he’s up to no good around the neighborhood But fo’ your information - alot of my brothers got education (now check it) You got ya wallstreet brotha, ya blue collar brotha, Your down for whatever chillin on the corner brother A talented brotha, and to everyone of y’all behind bars You know that Angie loves ya

Black Brotha, I love ya, I will never - try to hurt ya I want ya, to know that, I’m here for you - forever true cuz youre my Black Brotha, I love ya, I will never - try to hurt ya”

The way to change this cycle is to make the criminal justice system more respectable. Butler said he sees three ideas in hip hop music for reforming the system. Hip hop says that those who hurt others deserve to be punished, he said. At the same time the perpetrators of crime often come from the community too, Butler said, so hip hop music preaches a compassion for criminals who still deserve respect, love, and fairness in a court of law.

“Punish them if you must, hip hop says, but don’t think of his choice the same way you think of some investment banker’s choice to commit a crime,” Butler said.

He said judges also need to think about incarceration’s impact on families and communities particularly in the African-American community. For example one-third of young black men have a criminal record which means many of them cannot find jobs, Butler said. He said under federal sentencing rules a corporation can be tried for a crime but that before the case is brought to court, prosecutors have to think about its effect on shareholders. Butler said that same standard should apply to people. Native Indians and Eskimos are overrepresented in the prison population in Canada, he said, and Canadian law says community effect must be taken into account when sentencing members of this group.

Hip hop glorifies some drugs but treats addicts and sellers differently, Butler said, and also offers commentary on selective enforcement on drug laws in the U.S. Butler said according to the National Institute of Health about 12 percent of drug users are African American. Meanwhile, U.S. Department of Justice figures show that 60 percent of those punished for drug crimes are black, he said. Butler said hip hop has more respect for drug sellers than users. In “Misunderstood” artist Lil’ Wayne talks about how he loves smoking marijuana and offers this commentary:

“You see one in every 100 Americans are locked up one in every 9 black Americans are locked up and see what the white guy was trying to stress was that the money we spend on sending a mothaf**ka to jail a young mothaf**ka to jail would be less to send his or her young ass to college see, and another thing the white guy was stressing was that our jails are populated with drug dealers, you know crack/cocaine stuff like that meaning due to the laws we have on crack/cocaine and regular cocaine police are only, I don't want to say only right, but sh*t only logic by riding around in the hood all day and not in the suburbs because crack cocaine is mostly found in the hood”

Prison as a concept itself has only been around for 200 years. Butler said hip hop music shows that prison is cruel, inhumane, fails communities and is counterproductive because it causes people to commit more crime. If the hip hop nation were to reform the criminal justice system, Butler said prison would be used sparingly to isolate dangerous individuals and wouldn’t be used to “just shame people or to send a message.”

Butler recognizes that hip hop music often has negative messages such as sexist and homophobic lyrics. There’s no excuse for these types of lyrics, he said, and that these attitudes need to change. Butler said hip hop artists also need to be smarter about the work they produce so that the messages they send reach more people in the African American community. About 70 percent of hip hop consumers are white, he said.

In his book, Butler also addressed the idea of jury nullification. Jury nullification is when a jury votes for an acquittal even if they believe someone is guilty of a crime as a form of protest to the criminal justice system. It’s a constitutional practice, he said, and during his time as a federal prosecutor he saw many juries in Washington D.C. vote to acquit young black men so that another member of their community wouldn’t go to prison. Jury nullification has been used strategically throughout history to help reform the system, he said, such as during the prohibition era and in runaway slave cases that were tried in northern courts. Butler said he advocates for jury nullification in non-violent drug cases.

Butler’s talk was sponsored by the DuSable Museum and the McCormick Freedom Project. The Post-Exchange is owned by the McCormick Freedom Project.