In this Jan. 26, 2016, photo, Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump is joined by Joe Arpaio at a campaign event in Marshalltown, Iowa. Trump’s pardon of Arpaio does not fit either category very well. Arpaio is 85, but he had not even yet been sentenced; that hearing was set for October. That in turn circles back to the public policy rationale for pardons. Rather than “restore the tranquility of the commonwealth” (as Hamilton thought a pardon might do), Trump’s action seems likely to harden its divisions.

Source: Washington Post August 26, 2017 15:45 UTC