DC: More Like a State, And Some

There is an effort about to have the Mayor of the District of Columbia be given the power to pardon and commute sentences. Currently this power sits with the President of the United States.

A Professor Abbe Smith, of Georgetown University has suggested that there are very "few" such grants. Of course, these days, there are "few" grants anywhere, in any state, relatively thinking.

We made a casual run through our own historical data, however, and found what might be considered quite a few more DC grants than suggested in initial reports.

To get a greater sense of proportionality, we compared those grants to the total number of grants by each president, and the number of grants one might expect in a 51 unit model (each state plus DC) with an equal number of grants for each unit. Here are the results:

President	Pardons / Commutations	Expected DC Grants in 51 Unit Model	Actual Pardons / Commutations from D.C.	Difference
Eisenhower	1140	22	32	+10
Kennedy	572	11	22	+11
Johnson	1187	23	31	+8
Nixon	923	18	14	-4
Ford	409	8	11	+3
Carter	566	11	16	+5
Reagan	408	8	8	even
Clinton	460	9	12	+3
W. Bush	200	4	1	-3

These data suggest that, if anything, the District of Columbia traditionally gets more than its fair share of clemency grants. The Editor has the ability to run this analysis straight back to 1789 but has no reason to think the results would be any different.

So, if anything, supporters of the change - to Mayoral clemency - should not couch their argument in terms of neglect. Instead, they should argue that clemency data suggest  the District has, more or less, taken on the characteristics of a state (and some) and should be treated accordingly.