One of the remarkable phenomena of our time is the persistence of the belief among those in power that we can coerce people into decent behavior if only we make the punishment tough enough. We keep imagining that the problem is that young people aren't frightened enough, so we keep toughening criminal sanctions. The real problem is that our young people aren't hopeful enough. They don't see that they have it within their means to transform not merely their own lives but the society. They have the power.-William Raspberry, journalist and Pulitzer Prize winner (1995) Prisons cage parents. Prisons also warehouse mentors, teachers, leaders, and potential role models for the next generation. Indeed, whether they know it or not, the 2 million men and women in prisons and jails across the country have the power to change the future. At least, this was the message Rev. Jesse Jackson gave to the residents of Cook County jail in Chicago in a Christmas day sermon (Raspberry, 1995, p. A16). Rev. Jackson urged the prisoners to redirect their anger, let go of their bitterness, and stop feeling sorry for themselves. Instead, he suggested they follow the path of Malcolm X, who, realizing that he could not change the past, decided that he would therefore have to change the future. Raspberry (1995) wrote: It was not, of course, what inmates are accustomed to hearing. Generally they are excoriated as social vermin, fit only for being caged or exterminated, or else pitied as victims of social forces over which they have little control. There's truth in both versions. But there is greater truthredemptive truth-in what Jackson preached on Christmas, (p. A16) 131

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