Editorial: Congress should stop passing feel-good laws

Thursday, Feb. 18, 1999 | 12:08 p.m.

Last week the ABA approved a resolution calling on Congress to get rid of the independent counsel statute, which has been abused by a number of out-of-control prosecutors. And this week an ABA task force released a report that says Congress' passage of a flurry of federal criminal laws has failed; Congress instead should resist the urge to pass more federal crime legislation.

The ABA study points out that of federal criminal laws enacted since the Civil War, 40 percent were passed since 1970. But the ABA contends that more federal laws don't mean that justice has improved. In practice, the task force notes, there has been little impact since federal law enforcement reaches a small amount of violent crimes. For instance, the 1994 law making drive-by shootings a federal offense didn't result in the filing of a single charge in 1997. In addition, the task force says that money provided to federal prosecutors would be better used for state law-enforcement systems, which then avoids an unnecessary duplication.

Hopefully members of Congress will heed the report's findings and control themselves the next time a sensational crime happens. Adding another crime to the federal code may not necessarily do much good, especially if it can be handled better at the state level.