The Drug Court Response: Issues and Implications for Justice Change
![handle is hein.journals/albany63 and id is 935 raw text is: THE DRUG COURT RESPONSE: ISSUES AND
IMPLICATIONS FOR JUSTICE CHANGE
John S. Goldkamp*
Whenever any new type of cause arises, the primitive device
is to set up a new court .... [I]n a time in which unification is
sorely needed, the tendency to make new courts is still
strong with us.1
I. INTRODUCTION: THE EMERGENCE OF A JUDICIAL INNOVATION
Judicial Fad or Catalyst for Fundamental Change in the Courts?
By all measures, the growth of drug treatment courts in the United
States has been extraordinary since the establishment of the first
court in Dade County, Florida in 1989.2 There are upwards of 425
courts reportedly now in operation and others in some stage of
planning or preparation.8 Dean Pound's comments from just after the
turn of the last century offer a historical precedent for posing useful
questions about the extent to which the drug court movement
represents significant change in the way courts deliver justice and
about why criminal courts are the preferred vehicle for accomplishing
these aims.4 Pound's explicit criticism that the establishment of the
specialized courts of his time (e.g., juvenile court, family court, probate
court) represented poorly thought-out, short-sighted responses to any
* Professor of Criminal Justice at Temple University. The author would like to thank
Cheryl Irons-Guynn, Jennifer Robinson, Doris Weiland, and Michael White for their helpful
comments on the Article in its draft stages.
Roscoe Pound, The Administration of Justice in the Modern City, 26 HARV. L. REV. 302, 308
(1913).
2 See Fulton Hora et al., Therapeutic Jurisprudence and the Drug Treatment Court Movement:
Revolutionizing the Criminal Justice System's Response to Drug Abuse and Crime in America, 74
NOTRE DAME L. REV. 439, 454 (1999) (noting the establishment of the first drug court).
3 Marilyn Roberts, Director of the Drug Court Program Office of the Office of Justice
Programs, reports 425 drug courts in operation in the United States at the beginning of 2000.
4 See Pound, supra note 1, at 302-10 (discussing the chief problems of the formative period of
American law and the shift from judicial needs in a rural community to those in a growing urban
community).](ViewImageLocal?handle=hein.journals/albany63&div=37&collection=&method=preview&ext=.png&size=3)
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The Drug Court Response: Issues and Implications for Justice Change
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