Presidential Pardon Season

The time is here and once again we have a lame duck President. In the past, this time frame has been used by previous presidents to start pardoning people at a wholesale rate. Eisenhower, Reagan, Bush, and Clinton all gave the majority of their presidential pardons during their lame duck period, with Clinton outpacing the other three on that front in pardoning roughly 65% of his 459 pardons during that time. Eisenhower used this power on around 15% of his whopping 1,157 pardons. Ronald Reagan comes in at around 12% of his 406 in that period and Bush finishes his lame duck period with about 39% of his 200. It's noteworthy to mention, they were the only two term Presidents since the 22nd amendment imposing term limits for Presidents was made law until now President Obama. The list of crimes committed by the pardoned individual covers the whole legal spectrum. From Drug traffickers and security frauds to bank robbers and child porn, pardons were given. Relatives like Roger Clinton, business associates like those involved in Whitewater, a Pakistani drug trafficker and even George Steinbrenner were all given pardons.

A pardon is one of the last powers a President has to wield with Republican and Democrat Presidents alike wielding it. This seems to be an unchecked situation for abuse of power. I understand the sentiment behind the pardon is to right a wrong or to give a President the opportunity to say they feel the debt has been paid to society. However the sheer numbers of those that have been pardoned suggest that there is indeed abuse going on. You can't tell me that each of the Presidents has had intimate knowledge that all that they have pardoned were wronged. Did they attend the trials? Of course not. They pardon criminals people, criminals. Those who have been found guilty of breaking a law or laws and for whatever selfish reason they have, a lame duck President spits in the face of justice and pardons convicted criminals. There is way too many pardons to analyze each one in an attempt to tell what the motive behind the action was but seriously, since 1951 there have been over 5,900 pardons, commutations or rescinds by our Presidents. That's a big number of scum put back into our society. President Obama has one more opportunity to actually make a change before he leaves. On the issue of lame duck pardons, be like with drugs. Just say no.