Review: Let's Get Free: A Hip Hop Theory of Justice

Let's Get Free: A Hip-Hop Theory of Justice. The New Press, 2010. 224 pages, $11.41

by Melody Andrews
                                                                                         

Two years ago, Jamal Michael Barrow was released and deported to Belize after serving a nine year stint in a New York prison. In 2010, Torrence Hatch was indicted on a first degree murder charge.  Last month, Clifford Joseph Harris, Jr. was released from an Arkansas prison.  Last week, Troy Davis was executed by lethal injection in Georgia.  It is no doubt that the mainstream ideology is that rap is synonymous with crime. Three of the aforementioned men are rappers who have had highly publicized brushes with the law.  Troy Davis, however, was not a rapper.  He was an African American man serving time in a federal penitentiary, like 2.3 million Americans just like him (Butler 30).   Currently the United States of America has a higher incarceration rate than any other nation in the free world (Butler 29).   This comes to no surprise to Professor Paul Butler who is a former prosecutor and the author of Let’s Get Free: A Hip Theory of Justice.

            At the height of Butler’s career as a prosecutor in the District of Columbia he was arrested and tried for a crime he did not commit.  Until then Butler had never realized what those individuals he bought charges against go through.   He never considered their potential innocence or the factors that got them in the predicament.  Until his own arrest, Butler lived by the prosecutor’s rule that 99 percent of those individuals accused of crimes are guilty (Butler 19).   Butler’s Let’s Get Free illustrates his awakening to the truth about the system of crime and punishment that operates in the United States.  In his debut book, Butler examines the prison system in various socioeconomic terms such as the way imprisonment affects the family structure, race relations and the economic implications of what he calls “mass incarceration.” In the true fashion of hip hop, Butler presents a controversial outlook on the justice system in America through his perception and style, examinations of hip hop popular culture and the implications for the future of the American justice system.

            Paul Butler was raised by a single mother on the South Side of Chicago (Butler 12).  He stayed out of trouble (to the contempt of his peers) and went on to study at Yale and later Harvard Law (Butler 12).  Although the odds were stacked against him, he pulled himself up by his proverbial boot straps and went on to excel.  His bright and getting brighter future did not include getting arrested for simple assault.  However, without experiencing that brush with the law and obtaining a record, the former prosecutor probably would have never penned Let’s Get Free.  It goes without saying that Butler’s style in Let’s Get Free was influenced by both his experience as a prosecutor and being prosecuted.  Though his phrasing reflects his education, it is not at all uptight or stiff.  He exhibits a flow and liquidity that envelopes the reader in Butler’s mind and thoughts. For instance, the first chapter, which reads like a dramatic urban novel, allows the reader to grow with Butler through his achievements and ultimately his downfall.  The chapter’s title, “The Hunter Gets Captured by the Game: A Prosecutor Meets American Criminal Justice,” foreshadows the twist of fate Butler experiences. Butler employs use of the hip hop term “the game,” which sets a slightly casual tone for the entire work.   One literary technique and theme that appears throughout Let’s Get Free is irony.  The basis of the book is pure irony. Prosecutor turned prisoner turned advocate for judicial reform.  Chapter five begins with this ironic anecdote:

“Kathryn Johnston had spent all of her eighty-eight years in the city of Atlanta […], and she was scared to death[...] She kept a gun to protect herself against intruders. The intruders, three of them, came late one Tuesday night […] the men, dressed in street clothes, began tearing down the front door. The old woman took her pistol and fired one shot through the door. She missed. The three invaders rammed the door open and returned fire. Thirty-nine times. After they killed Mrs. Johnston, they put her in handcuffs. The intruders were Jason Smith, Gregg Junnier, and Arthur Tesler, all officers of the Atlanta Police Department,” (Butler 72).

It is extremely ironic that the elderly Kathryn Johnston, who lived in constant fear of drug dealers and thugs in her own neighborhood, would ultimately be slain by the very individuals who she was sure would protect her: the police.  Another notable example of Butler’s use of irony is seen in the second chapter, when Butler describes the disparity between sentencing for cocaine and crack-cocaine related crimes.  After the death of a college basketball player resulting from cocaine overdose, legislatures decided to make crack cocaine related crimes punishable at a one to one hundred ratio in comparison to cocaine in its powder form (Butler 39, 40). Toxicology reports later revealed that Bias’s death was not from crack cocaine but the powder substance (Butler 40).  In the long run, Butler’s use of ironic antidotes aid in linking the culture of hip hop to the culture of justice.

Though the full hip hop element of Butler’s Let’s Get Free appears late in the work (it is not discussed in full detail until Chapter 7), it provides an artistic approach to all the statistical data discussed in previous chapters.  Butler states that the chapter serves as the soundtrack for his thoughts on the justice system (Butler 108).  He successfully illustrates that though educated and once a prosecutor he is still “down.” Of all the attributes to hip hop that Butler discusses a few are notable for their direct ties to popular hip hop.  The snitch is one of these attributes.  Nearly everyone who’s ever had siblings has heard their mother’s warning that no one likes a snitch.  That very saying is definitely true in hip hop culture, this is evident in the Baltimore based Stop Snitching campaign and even more so in the cautionary “snitches get stitches.”  However Butler’s approach to snitches is not of a threatening nature, instead he asserts that snitching harms more than it helps the community.  Snitches are defined by Butler as, “informants who receive a reward, usually cash or leniency from prosecution, in exchange for providing law enforcement with information about criminals,”  (Butler 74).  This is profoundly different from the mainstream ideology of the beneficial bell ringer.  Even though Butler does not condone snitching to get ahead, he does support witnesses doing their civic duty and helping to solve crimes in the community.  The difference, Butler says, is that snitches tattle only when it is beneficial to them (Butler 74).  The portion of Let’s Get Free that is dedicated to snitches arouses a few questions in the reader, one being if Butler had not been snitched on himself by a neighbor would he feel so strongly against them?  This question makes it difficult for Butler’s opinions and findings to be read as unbiased.  Even though he does make valid points against them, his discussion is often full of generalizations.  Another, less controversial theme prevalent in hip hop that appears in Butler’s work is the idea of change.

Over a beat sampled from Zapp and Roger’s “Be Alright,” Tupac rhymed about hard economic times and streets full of crime; the daily struggle to survive for some Americans. A simple phrase served as his reminder to the poor, hustlers and single mothers that bleak situations would get better: keep ya head up.  Hip hop, as mentioned in Jeff Chang’s work Can’t Stop Won’t Stop, originated as a form of rebellion in the midst of social and economic oppression. A struggle for change and at its core hip hop has remained just that.  Coincidentally, that is exactly what Butler is calling for in Let’s Get Free.  During the course of the book he encourages the masses to stand up what against what he calls mass incarceration rates in the United States.   Butler does this by presenting startling numbers that for every one Caucasian male incarcerated there are eight African-American males incarcerated (Butler 38).  Butler suggests that the justice system in America needs a new approach and that hip hop may be just what it needs.  He states that,

“Hip-hop offers a fresh approach. It first seems to embrace retribution […] The “unwritten law in rap,” according to Jay-Z, is that “if you shoot my dog, I’ma kill yo’ cat… know dat / For every action there’s a reaction.”  Next, however, comes the remix. Hip-hop takes punishment personally. Many people in the hip-hop nation have been locked up or have loved ones who have been. […]You understand criminal justice differently when the people that you love experience being “locked down all day, underground, neva seein’ the sun / Vision stripped from you, neva seein’ your son,”  (Butler 108)”

Butler highlights that African American and Hispanic men dominate the hip hop industry as well as prisons (Butler 109).   He suggests that because hip hop is an extremely popular genre with influences in all forms of art and media, it has the power to influence and ultimately change the law and how it affects those individuals it is supposed to protect.

            The phrase “police state” evokes images of Nazi occupied Germany, a place where freedom is hardly imaginable and being watched under strict supervision is the norm.   Let’s Get Free warns against letting the government and law enforcement agencies having too much power.  The author insists that giving more power to law enforcement means that the civil liberties of individual citizens is being invaded without them even realizing it (Butler 37).  In theory, Butler is correct a police state would be disastrous for America and although he provides strong evidence to support his argument and suggestions on how people can ultimately “get more free” he often fails to provide concrete ways to implement his plans against what he calls mass incarceration.  isHis ideas are profound and fairly innovative, but their effect on the future of the American justice system is unclear.  Sure, Butler has eloquently made suggestions and predictions about the future of crime and punishment in the United States, but in essence that is all that they are. With Butler’s many suggestions is rarely a rebuttal or any negating factors. There is little to no mention of how the recent recession has affected the crime rates, which was utterly surprising considering that Butler consistently provided the numbers to support his findings.  Let’s Get Free is without a doubt a good start for Butler’s movement and the only way for it to materialize is for people to read it, understand it and care about the issues that it poses.  The movement to a freer America needs manpower and political support to implement and instill Butler’s plans.

            Let’s Get Free, a novel by former prosecutor Paul Butler is without a doubt captivating.  It quickly engages the reader and not only encourages the reader to think, but requires them to do so in order to gain a complete understanding of what Butler is presenting.  Every nation has its problems, with that being said it does not mean that numbers of those inhabiting prisons and jails is not an appalling predicament.  But it would be better if Butler’s plan started with baby steps and not just jumped to freeing 500,000 on a whim.  It’s not that simple. Like he stated early on there is nothing simple about crime and punishment (Butler 11) and because of that there is no simple solution.  Let’s Get Free is without a doubt a great read.  It is riveting and engaging.  The book presents situations that most Americans rarely ponder when watching CSI or Law and Order.  Correcting the issues of America’s justice system sounds almost effortless, but the reality is that Let’s Get Free is in fact no easy answer.