A couple days ago, Daniel Lawlor pulled out the old saw of Rhode Island’s corrupt politics, telling us “political corruption is nothing new to Rhode Island.” While Mr. Lawlor’s article is nothing more than really a brief political history of the state, hardly more objectionable then telling us that some folks don’t wash their hands after going to the bathroom, it ties into a serious misapprehension about the state; namely that Rhode Island is a corrupt one. While I would hate to deprive people something to complain about, the facts don’t align with that particular point of view.
In reality, two different rankings (relying on federal data) have been published in the past year which put corruption nowhere near any sort of objectionable levels. The most recent is a study that showed up just over a week ago. Published by the University of Illinois at Chicago’s Political Science Department, the report is titled “Chicago and Illinois, Leading the Pack in Corruption” and shows exactly what it says, that Illinois’ has convicted more people on public corruption charges than any other major metropolitan area. Providence and Rhode Island don’t even rank in the top 15.
Going down the list of appendices, we discover that from 2001 to 2010, the United States Attorney’s Office of Rhode Island convicted exactly 23 people of public corruption. States that ranked equal to or lower were Idaho (23), New Hampshire (16), Wyoming (16), and Vermont (15). In just totals, Rhode Island is the fifth least corrupt state in the entire United States. Per capita may change that number, but still not to astronomical levels.*
The Daily Beast released corruption rankings of the states and the District of Columbia nearly two years ago. Using a slightly different period of time (1998-2008), The Beast ranked states according to an aggregate of five categories of convictions; public corruption, racketeering and extortion (organized crime), forgery and counterfeiting, fraud, and embezzlement. Only one of those categories exclusive applies to public officials; the rest can all be committed by private citizens. The Beast ranked their top ten most corrupt states (from greatest to least) as Tennessee, Virginia, Mississippi, Delaware, North Carolina, Florida, Nevada, Pennsylvania, South Carolina and Oklahoma. Where did Rhode Island fall? 11th? 15th? 20th? 25th?
27th. Out of 50 states and the District of Columbia, Rhode Island fell in a respectable slightly below the middle. However, it wasn’t public corruption or organized crime (we ranked 32nd in each). What brought our position up was fraud (14th) and embezzlement (7th), crimes completely capable of being committed by private citizens. Indeed, The Daily Beast singled out Lisa Torres of Johnston as their example. For those keeping track, we ranked 44th in forgery and counterfeiting.
The reality is that a state like Rhode Island is well-suited to battling corruption and keeping it out of the state. A relatively small population lowers the possibilities, while the high density means keeping corruption a secret is next to impossible. The ease of access the Rhode Island press corps has to lawmakers (I mean physically, it’s far easier to reach them then say those in Illinois), combined with our capital’s location in a major metropolitan area and media market increases the incentive to play by the rules. At present, the big news story of possible corruption was Sam Zurier, in a tiff with some constituents over the paltry sum of $100. Considering the circus that went on over that, the reaction if someone was corrupt for a sum of real value would probably overwhelm us for months.
Citizens have every right to complain about government, and I don’t blame them for viewing the state in a negative light, since focusing on the negative is a common experience for people. But to tar our government with the brush of false corruption is a reckless thing. Rhode Island is a relative example of a government that plays by the rules (whether those rules are unfair and whether the winner is who we’d like it to be are other discussions). It’s time we congratulated ourselves for that, instead of insulting our own state. Corruption may not be new to us, but it is growing foreign to us.
*UPDATED:
According to my math (it may be shaky), Rhode Island ranks about 37th or 38th out of 53 states and territories in per capita public corruption convictions per 10000 residents. D.C.’s numbers may be inflated because it often tries officials from other states. Due to rounding, position numbers are not 100% accurate. Numbers utilize total convictions from 2001-2010 per U.S. Attorney’s Office District (states/territories with multiple offices have had totals combined) and the state’s population in the 2010 census.
- DC: 5.6 per 10000
- Guam & NMI: 3.56 per 10000
- Virgin Islands: 3.38 per 10000
- Georgia: 2.29 per 10000
- Louisiana: 0.85 per 10000
- North Dakota: 0.82 per 10000
- Puerto Rico: 0.74 per 10000
- South Dakota: 0.73 per 10000
- Florida: 0.70 per 10000
- Alaska: 0.67 per 10000
- Kentucky: 0.65 per 10000
- Mississippi: 0.60 per 10000
- Montana: 0.60 per 10000
- Alabama: 0.57 per 10000
- Delaware: 0.51 per 10000
- Virginia: 0.52 per 10000
- New Jersey: 0.49 per 10000
- Illinois: 0.44 per 10000
- Ohio: 0.43 per 10000
- Pennsylvania: 0.43 per 10000
- Tennessee: 0.41 per 10000
- West Virginia: 0.39 per 10000
- Maryland: 0.38 per 10000
- Oklahoma: 0.36 per 10000
- Massachusetts: 0.32 per 10000
- Hawaii: 0.32 per 10000
- Missouri: 0.31 per 10000
- Arkansas: 0.30 per 10000
- New York: 0.30 per 10000
- Connecticut: 0.28 per 10000
- Texas: 0.28 per 10000
- Wyoming: 0.28 per 10000
- Arizona: 0.27 per 10000
- Maine: 0.26 per 10000
- Michigan: 0.25 per 10000
- Vermont: 0.24 per 10000
- New Mexico: 0.22 per 10000
- Rhode Island: 0.22 per 10000
- Wisconsin: 0.21 per 10000
- Colorado: 0.19 per 10000
- North Carolina: 0.19 per 10000
- California: 0.18 per 10000
- Iowa: 0.17 per 10000
- Idaho 0.15 per 10000
- Nebraska: 0.14 per 10000
- Utah: 0.14 per 10000
- Nevada: 0.13 per 10000
- Washington: 0.13 per 10000
- Kansas: 0.12 per 10000
- Minnesota: 0.12 per 10000
- New Hampshire: 0.12 per 10000
- South Carolina: 0.12 per 10000
- Oregon: 0.10 per 10000
Thank you, Samuel. This is just another one of those myths put forward, mostly by the conservative media, to demonize their political opponents. Just like the myth of the flight of the earls or the myth that Unions run the state, the corruption myth isn’t based on facts, its based upon agendas.
Excuse me, but the major problem with Rhode Island corruption isn’t that it is being prosecuted, it is the fact that it is NOT being prosecuted. A lot of what other areas would consider corruption is actually legal in Rhode Island, especially regarding nepotism, campaign contributions, patronage, double dipping, mass disability pension abuse, and the like. Even the hiring process at the very political AG’s office, which is *supposed* to be investigating these things and makes a token effort at best, makes a significant portion of their hiring decisions based on political patronage and campaign-contribution-related factors. Any figures without factoring in per capital (such as total convictions) are meaningless for Rhode Island, since it has a relatively small population, but even for the per capita figures, Iannazzi, Moreau, Sauro, and all the other unenforced “soft-corruption” crap that has gone on in recent years would not be included in them, and that is precisely the public image problem Rhode Island faces. The fact remains, and it is common knowledge in other states, that Rhode Island is a next to merit-less society in which practically all hiring, promotion, and public contract decisions are based on favors and who you know.
I’ll do up the per capita math right now.
next thing you know we’ll be chasing black helicopters around too. and here I was hoping the tin foil hats had been put away.
Pat – Your jokes don’t even make sense – how could anyone “chase around” a helicopter?
You’ve been quiet lately. I thought maybe the “RIFuture Board” told you to stay away from the new site because you became too much of a liability and controversial figure during its last incarnation. You treated the last RIFuture site like the NEA union’s wholly-owned propaganda machine and we all saw what happened to readership as a result of that.
@RightToWork
You have no evidence of any of that, absolutely none. You can talk about all this stuff but present no statistical evidence. What your talking about is all hearsay.
“No evidence?” The papers have documented the Iannazzi, Moreau, and Sauro shenanigans from here to China. Everyone knows it’s all crooked – and what happened? Nothing, Nothing, and Nothing. I lived in Rhode Island for 26 years, so I know how it all works. I applied to the AG’s office after I graduated law school and I was solicited for campaign contributions. Would you like to go to the public payrolls? Disability retirement for the Providence Fire Department was 8 out of 10 in the early 90′s. It’s still at an absurd 58% – How many rescinded pensions? How many prosecutions? 0 and 0, and it’s the same thing for the police. Don’t tell me there’s “no evidence.” Everyone knows how things work around RI… I suppose Iannazzi earned his 90k at the state house working for Ruggerio? Ha!
I’ve added an updated list. I based my numbers on the way the study I lifted them from calculated per capita, but a 2006 study used average by year to calculate, rather than totals. It’ll take a bit of time, but I can rejigger the numbers around that, if folks want. Also, that study used numbers from 1976-2002.
The issue, as others have pointed out, RightToWork, is that not prosecuted is a difficult number to calculate. It’s like asking me to calculate how many people in the state are having sex right now. I can give you a rough estimate, but it won’t be accurate. And even that is easier to calculate. I know of no studies that asked people how often they participated in corrupt practices. I would gamble that any such study would be less reliable than one that asked people how often they had sex.
Indeed, it’s possible that because RI is small enough and dense enough that when corruption is found out, it is a much bigger deal than in a larger state, since it can travel quickly through the media and easily reach nearly everyone in the state. Larger states, with more people, rural capitals and large distances can have a lot of trouble exposing corruption, especially as local news eliminate their state house bureaus.
We can view things as corrupt, but until they’re legislated against, they are legal.
Finally, in regards to your nepotism/patronage/cronyism complaint, that may be true, but if it is, it extends to the private sector just as much, perhaps more so.
Samuel – I agree with you – it is difficult or impossible to measure. That doesn’t mean it isn’t going on. Just because nobody is prosecuted doesn’t make it legal – it just means there is no justice in the state when it comes to influential people. The difference between the nepotism and patronage in the public and private sectors is that in the public sector it is SUPPOSED to be against the law. Private businesses only destroy themselves with that crap, and those who voluntarily invest in them. When the government goes rotten the entire state suffers.
The argument isn’t that it isn’t going on, it’s that since it’s near-impossible to measure, it’s impossible to compare the two across states. Especially since I think other states are likely to have unique quirks in their laws that would be considered corrupt practices in Rhode Island.
Your initial argument wasn’t that illegal practices were going on, it was that Rhode Island’s law was written so that corrupt practices were allowed to thrive. That was what I was addressing. I would never mean to insinuate that a crime not prosecuted is legal.
I think we sometimes view bad or unresponsive government as corrupt government. While the two may often be connected, they are not always the same.
You’re right – we need to define what we are talking about because definitions on what constitutes corruption can differ. When the original, legitimate purposes of government (or any institution for that matter) have been subverted in order to serve illegitimate individual purposes instead, I view that as a corruption of the function of government. It could be illegal, legal, or de facto legal through lack of prosecution. So, for example, in the early 90′s the union-dominated retirement board awarded 5-6% COLAs to Providence police and firefighters. That means their pensions have a doubling time of 11.9 years and can potentially reach $1 million/year during their lifetime. This absurdity is the complete opposite of serving the public interest and has directly contributed to the bankrupting of the city, so I (and most, I hope) view it as a form of corruption, even if it is legal in RI.
“Finally, in regards to your nepotism/patronage/cronyism complaint, that may be true, but if it is, it extends to the private sector just as much, perhaps more so.”
There’s a big difference here. People are FORCED to pay for public sector corruption.
We pay for private sector corruption as well.
I have to say I think RTW has the overall better arguments here. Even when not criminally convicted (as has happened here in North Providence all too often, sometimes because those caught were perhaps not very bright), the who-you-know-where’s-mine pervasiveness is hard to measure but I too have a lot of anecdotal evidence in many fields as to how that undermines effectiveness. I think progressives should take this kind of corruption more seriously because the reality and perception of widespread abuse undermines the willingness of the public to support government efforts to tackle problems even when the private sector has failed.
Using convictions to measure corruption could be flipped on it’s head easily as measurement of governments effectiveness in prosecuting corruption. Being a low number on the conviction list may just be interpreted as being more corrupt.
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