NWA EDITORIAL: Hard to read

We've never really heard of anyone who runs for sheriff out of a passion for operating a county jail.

Running a jail is an obligation of the larger external job of enforcing laws, solving crimes, arresting suspects and responding to emergencies. Law enforcement officers, if we're allowed a bit of generalization, tend toward a mindset of getting out in the community, protecting and serving. Jails are a necessity of that function -- the accused and convicted have to go someplace -- but as an administrator or as a politician, jails represent potential liabilities and headaches.

Sheriffs, though, ignore jail operations at their own peril. Depriving a person of liberty in the United States of America is, thankfully, not something that can be done haphazardly or without regard to ideals of due process. The U.S. judicial system, with all its warts and failings in need of attention, is nonetheless more constrained toward protection of the innocent than wholesale conviction of the suspected.

Standards for county lock-ups tend to reflect that. A system that relies on an assumption of innocence -- and thank goodness ours is at least designed to rely on that -- demands humane treatment of those whose circumstances land them in the hoosegow, many of them awaiting trial and not convicted.

So how are we, as a society, to treat those who have taken up temporary residence in the pokey?

Decently. That doesn't seem too high a standard. Not the Ritz-Carlton, but not the flagstone-floored dungeon under the courthouse known as Hell on the Border in 1870s Fort Smith.

Perhaps that's why Benton County Sheriff Shawn Holloway recently announced a book drive to provide inmates in his jail with reading material. Jails certainly need to be secure places, but they don't have to be isolation tanks. Providing ways for inmates to pass the time and maybe even learn a thing or two can't be a bad thing.

We're glad to hear Holloway has chosen to promote the opportunity for inmates to read.

The jail previously had a collection of books, mostly donated, that inmates could access. As with a lot of things within jails and prisons, they're viewed as privileges. About six months ago, it was Holloway's administration that decided to get rid of all the books in the jail largely because some inmates were damaging them or using them destructively within the jail. Naturally, in a pandemic, shared books also raise some covid concerns.

It was an overreaction, but to say there was a public outcry over the move would be an extreme overstatement. Jailed people are, by and large, a constituency without much representation. Sheriffs and other political leaders don't care to look like they're "soft on crime." But, after a story appeared in our newspaper, the American Civil Liberties Union criticized the book ban, claiming it violated the First Amendment rights of inmates.

Does it? Well, some courts have held that prisoners have a right to read, but those rights don't trump the need for security. Security, however, can usually be achieved without an outright ban on books.

Reading is fundamental, you might have heard. Most critically in one's younger years, but reading contributes to a person's development at every stage in life. And yes, that even applies to people who get crossways with the law. A jail conviction or an arrest, at least in every criminal case we've ever covered, has never been accompanied by a sentence to be deprived of reading.

If this sounds like bleeding heart stuff, consider this, too: An inmate who is actually reading is an inmate who isn't causing problems in the confines of the jail. Jailers have an interest in keeping tempers from flaring or behaviors from being shaped only by boredom. Jails are bleak places. Books can make them more tolerable without creating that imaginary lap of luxury some critics of jail policies have been known to think exists in confinement.

We're glad to see the return of books, even if it might just be Holloway's attempt to eliminate the public relations headache their removal created several months back. Removing the books as a form of punishment for a few inmates' bad behavior seems short-sighted, given the fact populations in jails -- unlike in prisons -- usually turn over pretty quickly.

Word is Holloway is looking into digital options for reading materials, which might work. But it seems a lot of new programs to offer high-tech solutions in jails come with some kind of fee system for inmates and their families and revenue for jail. Access to reading shouldn't become that.

Whether with good old-fashioned books or a digital option, inmates generally ought to have a chance to access reading material. Getting booked shouldn't have to mean getting unbooked.