By Cameron Bertron
Anyone who reads Les Miserables empathizes deeply with Jean Valjean. We understand the desperation which drove him to crime. We feel the hatred which the injustice of his sentence fermented in his heart. We suffer the pain of his rejection by society. But when it comes to empathizing with criminals in our own system, we recoil. However, the conditions faced by Valjean in the early 1800’s are hideously mirrored in our own system today. There are men behind bars right now facing far harsher sentences for far pettier crimes then Valjean’s. Even after release, these ex-offenders stand little chance at regaining normalcy. Society has made great strides in human rights since Valjean’s time, but our fundamental approach to criminal justice has hardly improved. Our system perfectly replicates the conditions which made Valjean a brutal man, while leaving no room for redemption.
Jean Valjean entered prison a frightened and bewildered young man, he left it a very dangerous criminal. This disturbing transformation was not only inevitable, it was a predictable result of his unjust sentence. Valjean wondered why his youth was taken in exchange for a victimless crime. He asked how it could be called justice that society condemn those with the least privilege, and that those who deserve the most mercy were the first to suffer. “With those questions asked and answered, he condemned society and sentenced it. He sentenced it to his hatred.” (Les Miserables, page 88)
How can someone resist hatred when they’ve been so ruthlessly condemned? In return for Valjean’s theft, his life was stolen. Under our current system, Americans lose their youths, and even their lives, for a foolish mistake. In the US there are currently 3,278 nonviolent offenders serving life sentences. For five of them it was a first offense. They committed such heinous crimes as, “having an unweighably small amount of cocaine in a shirt pocket, selling $10 worth of crack to a police informant… shoplifting three belts, breaking into an empty liquor store, and possessing stolen wenches.” (The Economist, “Throwing Away the Key”) Nineteen years for a loaf of bread seems mild compared to the sentences being served by these Americans.
When the sentence is met and the price for crime paid, things hardly improve. Valjean experienced this himself. He was paid less for equal work and rejected at every turn because of his paperwork. The only way he escaped this discrimination was through destroying his documents and starting new. For modern ex-offenders this would be impossible. Our world is too dependent on paper trails and documentation to allow for a man to slip through and start a new life. A 2010 study from the center for Economic and Policy research reported that only 40% of employers would even consider hiring job applicants with a criminal history. Felons suffer the pointlessly vindictive measure of being disenfranchised. They are also, in most states, ineligible for public housing, food stamps, disability benefits, and other government assistances. As a society we could not make it clearer that we have no desire to allow ex-offenders back into normalcy. In America it is as Valjean thought, “A convict may leave prison behind, but never his sentence.” (Les Miserables, page 96)
A ridiculously high recidivism rate is the price we pay for our injustice. By sentencing too harshly we cultivate bitterness and hate. By blocking reintegration, we recreate the conditions of poverty and neglect which likely led to the first crime. The Bureau of Justice reported in 2016 that 76% of prisoners will be re-arrested for another crime within five years. This fact is not surprising, rather it is a predictable consequence of a system which offers little mercy and almost no way out.
Valjean’s example should make us question how many other people have had all the softness and kindness crushed out of them by our justice system. We can do better. We must do better. If we are willing to allow a little mercy into our courtrooms, willing to welcome ex-offenders into our places of work, our polling stations, and our lives, then we could see the world change. Jean Valjean suffered both ends of extreme injustice and extraordinary grace. He walked away understanding that one person carries within themselves the potential to become boundlessly cruel or compassionate. He understood that people will generally do unto others as has been done unto them and so it falls on us as a society to design a system which returns hurt with healing. Valjean told this parable, “If we took a little time the nettle would be useful; we neglect it, and it becomes harmful. Then we kill it. Men are so like the nettle!… My friends, remember this: There are no bad herbs and no bad men; there are only bad cultivators.” (Les Miserables, 164)