Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act Fuels Mass Incarceration

President Bill Clinton signs the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994, the largest crime bill in U.S. history, consisting of 356 pages that provided for 100,000 new police officers and $9.7 billion in funding for prisons. Drafted by then-Senator Joe Biden and sponsored by Representative Jack Brooks of Texas, the legislation included a federal “three-strikes” provision mandating life imprisonment without possibility of parole for those who commit federal violent felonies with two or more previous convictions for violent felonies or drug trafficking crimes.

The act provided $12.5 billion in grants to fund incarceration, with nearly 50 percent earmarked for states that adopted “truth-in-sentencing” laws requiring people convicted of violent crimes to serve at least 85 percent of their sentences. By 1998, 27 states and the District of Columbia had enacted such laws to qualify for the funding. The provision helped fuel a prison construction boom, with the number of state and federal adult correctional facilities rising 43 percent from 1990 to 2005—for a period in the 1990s, a new prison opened every 15 days on average.

The Bureau of Justice Statistics projected in 1999 that the state prison population had increased by 57 percent to a high of 1,075,052 inmates. While supporters argued the bill reduced crime, critics contend it fundamentally shaped mass incarceration policies that disproportionately impacted communities of color and created lasting racial disparities in the criminal justice system.