Freeing Prisoners for Political Gain

As the United States works to continue the Israel-Palestine peace talks in the Middle East, some suggest the release of Jonathan Pollard as a means of ensuring the continuation of the process. Proponents of this plan argue that it will reflect the Americans’ stake in peace as well as prompt compromises from other parties. But considering freeing Pollard raises a broader question: When is it acceptable to release a prisoner? What role should politics play in determining a prisoner’s ultimate sentence?

The Middle East peace process is critical, and it is important that all sides compromise. But the American government needs to consider the overarching message that it would send to both its citizens and the international community if it frees a prisoner simply because it would achieve a political goal.

I’m not discussing whether Pollard should remain in jail. That’s a different question that centers on America’s foreign policy, its legal views of spies with allegiances to its allies, and considerations regarding the length of Pollard’s sentence. But I do believe that he should not be freed simply by virtue of his worth to the Israeli government.

While freeing Pollard would send a positive message to players in the Middle East, it would concurrently send a very negative one to Americans. It would suggest that the justice system in our country ultimately answers to political maneuvers, which are more important than the concept of absolute justice. Under this system, prisoners are not weighed on the basis of their crimes, but instead on their usefulness to the government as political pawns and weapons.

This type of double standard would skew our justice system by bringing political considerations into the courts. For our system to work, the fundamental principle must be that criminals will be equally and appropriately punished for their crimes regardless of who they are. Justice needs to be applied both blindly and uniformly.

Only with this standard of legal equality can citizens have full faith in their government. Citizens should be able to be confident in the fact that if someone else is brought to justice, he will be rightfully tried and, if found guilty, sentenced to the appropriate punishment.

One could potentially argue that as a spy, Pollard is a political prisoner, by definition separate from other crimes. But espionage and the revelation of American secrets is, while not directly an attack on another person, certainly an attack on the country and could critically threaten national security. As such, his crime should not be seen as a case wholly separate from other criminals. Instead, in order to ensure that government figures and others who can see classified government documents do not leak them to other countries, espionage should not be dismissed as insignificant, and those who engage in it should face the full length of justice that the courts and the government deem necessary.

Perhaps the central exception to this rule would be the exchange of political prisoners, which I see as different from the Pollard case. In 2010, for instance, following the discovery of a ring of Russian spies, the United States exchanged them for Russian-held prisoners accused of spying for the United Kingdom and the United States. But the freeing of these prisoners cannot be compared to the release of Pollard. Arranging a prisoner swap implies that all individuals are considered guilty, but that in order to free our own people we are willing to return some prisoners to their home countries. It is not about letting someone free to further a political goal, but about valuing the lives and freedoms of our own citizens above almost anything else.

In addition to the negative message that freeing a prisoner as part of a political maneuver would send to the American people, it would also be deleterious to America’s relations with other countries. If foreign nations understood that people from their countries or associated with their governments would be exempt from basic American law if they were sufficiently politically important, their behavior could dramatically change. Countries with political clout may feel more secure about their spies in the United States, knowing that if any were caught, the government could push to have them freed as part of any range of political agreements, not merely those contained in the field of espionage. Instead, countries must know to operate under the assumption that in general, any individuals caught spying will be held until their sentences are complete.

That’s not to say that anarchy would develop and blatant disregard for American law would ensue. But it does suggest that the concept of a double standard would be born, which could have ramifications both domestically and internationally. Our justice system prides itself on being an unbiased and impartial one. To the best of its ability, the government should work to ensure that it stays that way.

Edyt J. Dickstein ‘17, a Crimson editorial writer, lives in Thayer Hall.