Thus, despite Ashcroft's tough words, many criminologists say his new directive will not significantly change the number of years the worst criminals spend in prison.
"It's not as if those types of people aren't serving a huge amount of time already," said Michael Jacobson, a professor at the John Jay College of Criminal Justice in Manhattan.
Jacobson, a former New York City correction commissioner, is also a consultant to lawmakers in several states where interest in reducing or eliminating prison sentences has flourished as a way to cut recidivism and trim insatiable prison budgets.
"States just don't have the money, so there is this incredible willingness from folks on both sides of the aisle to come together and talk about these things," said Daniel Wilhelm, director of the state sentencing and corrections program at the Vera Institute of Justice, a Manhattan-based nonprofit group.
But to make sure federal jurists get the point, Ashcroft ordered prosecutors last month to begin notifying his office whenever a judge hands down a sentence more lenient than the range set by federal sentencing guidelines.
Another obvious difference in the disparity among federal and state sentencing guidelines is the cost. Most states are required by law to balance their annual bud-gets; the federal government is not. Unlike prison budgets in most large states, the expenditure for the federal Bureau of Prisons amounts to a microscopic fraction of overall spending.
"As long as Ashcroft doesn't feel particularly financially constrained," Jacobson said. "Then he's not going to feel a lot of pressure and the politics of this will still work at the federal level."
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