New restoration laws take center stage in second quarter of 2019
State legislatures across the country are moving quickly and creatively to repair some of the damage done by the War on Crime, which left a third of the adult U.S. population with a criminal record. In the second quarter of 2019, 26 states have enacted an eye-popping total of 78 separate new laws aimed at addressing the disabling effects of a record. Coupled with the laws enacted in the first quarter, the total for the first half of 2019 is 97 new laws enacted by 36 states. By way of comparison, in all of 2018 there were 61 new restoration laws enacted in 32 states and two territories, which was then a record.
Much of the new legislation this quarter is quite significant. Some states made their first substantial effort in decades to deal with the problems presented by record-based discrimination, while others refined and extended reforms enacted in the recent past. Some states enacted multiple laws dealing with the same restoration issue (Texas stands out with five laws on occupational licensing alone), and some dealt with multiple issues in one law (New York dealt with no fewer than twelve separate issues in a 2020 budget bill). Many of the specific laws enacted in the second quarter were anticipated by laws enacted by other states in the first.
As in the past, state lawmakers this quarter focused most of their attention on facilitating access to record-clearing, although a significant number of new laws regulate consideration of criminal record in the occupational licensing process. Another important area of progress is in restoration of voting rights. Other matters addressed by new laws include driver’s licenses and firearms; diversionary dispositions; and immigration consequences. Surprisingly few of the new laws deal directly with employment, perhaps on the assumption that limited access to criminal records will also limit employment discrimination, at least where a background check is not mandated by law (frequently an exception to sealing). Only one law enacted during this past quarter took a step backward to restrict an existing restoration measure (a significant development in Florida in the area of voting rights).
The new laws also display a remarkable variety, indicating either that the spirit of experimentation is alive and well in the States, or that States are desperate for law reform guidance, or both. Meanwhile, in stark contrast to this prolific state law-making, Congress has not attempted to deal with the problem of reintegration for more than a decade—either by reducing federal collateral consequences or by restoring rights to people with federal convictions.
Below, we describe some of the more significant new laws by category, covering voting rights, record-sealing, occupational licensing, immigration, and what for want of a better term we call “odds and ends.” For those interested in further details about the new laws, we have described and analyzed them in the state profiles and summary charts of the Restoration of Rights Project. (In order to access the full analysis of the new laws in the RRP, you must clink the link on the “summary” sheet labeled “Read the Full Profile.”)