Sentencing Guidelines

Historical Background

As of 2011, 21 states and the U.S. federal government used some form of sentencing guidelines. The development and implementation of sentencing guidelines reflected a long-standing concern with criminal sentence reform. Throughout the 1960s and early 1970s, a growing body of social scientific research evidence indicated that offenders with similar backgrounds and convicted of similar crimes often received different punishments. The variations in punishment were the result of indeterminate sentencing practices, which meant that offenders received a range for a prison sentence, such as six to 24 months or two to five years. The rationale for such nonspecific—indeterminate—sentences was rehabilitation: Offenders could anticipate an early release if they behaved well while incarcerated. Research on punishment practices in the 1960s and 1970s illustrated that there were disparities in both the length of time sentenced to prison and the length of time kept in prison that varied by social and demographic characteristics of offenders, even after accounting for the types of crimes committed and the nature of the prior record.

Interestingly, efforts aimed at sentence reform came from two very different political viewpoints. One broad group of reformers was concerned about the apparent effects that an offender's sex, race, or economic position had on the severity of the punishment received. Simultaneously, another broad group of reformers was concerned about punishments being too lenient for many offenders—that the early release of many offenders meant that punishments were not as harsh as some thought they should be. Consequently, from both sides of the political spectrum, sentencing guidelines, as well as a move to determinate sentencing, were seen as a means of making criminal punishments longer, but also more systematic and presumably fairer to convicted offenders.

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