Of course, the Supreme Court did the right thing when it said federal judges could take issue with sentencing guidelines that created a huge disparity between offenses involving crack and powdered cocaine. It also created a racial divide. Crack offenders were largely black; powder offenders, white.
Both fairness and common sense were winners.
But let’s not forget the context in which the crack-powder disparity arose. In the mid-1980s, communities were pleading to authorities to do something about the scourge that was crack cocaine and all the attendant crime directly associated with it.
Powder was more of a suburban party drug that didn’t exactly lend itself to home invasions, car jackings and generic assaults and murders.