Law, Order, and the End of the New Deal Consensus

ABSTRACT: In the 2020s, both US political parties have promised law and order while criticizing law enforcement power. This strange politics has coincided with a legitimacy crisis across institutions. Americans have taken for granted the stability that arose with the New Deal’s modernization of the liberal state, including in crime policy. Until the 1930s, the nation endured constant challenges for legitimacy, liberalism, and law and order. Franklin Roosevelt’s multipronged war on crime reconciled differences across jurisdictions, institutions, and approaches to incarceration and rehabilitation, while building an unprecedented coalition against lawlessness that transcended party, race, and class. Restoring legitimacy in this century would require a comparably ecumenical triumph in the politics of law and order.

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