OPEN THE JAILS: Obama issues record number of pardons as he decides for us who should go free

Note to President: most people in prison are there for a reason.

President Obama has pardoned or commuted the sentences of 231 felons, the greatest number of clemencies awarded in a single day.

LOS ANGELES, CA (California Network) - President Obama has issued nearly 1,200 clemencies ranging from full pardons to reductions of sentences, as well as shortening the sentences of thousands of non-violent offenders. It is part of his crusade to open the prisons and jails and to release more people onto the streets, many of their voting rights restored. Many of those receiving clemency are drug offenders.

A presidential pardon restores the right to vote, serve on a jury, and to run for public office.

Yesterday, Obama pardoned 78 felons and commuted 153 clemencies, shortening sentences in those cases.

Throughout his presidency, he has pardoned a total of 148 people and reduced 1,176 people. Of those, 395 were serving life sentences.

Obama has now granted clemency in more cases that the previous 11 presidents combined.

It used to be that the power to pardon was reserved to correct egregious breaches of justice. Cases of social injustice could be pardoned in shows of extraordinary mercy. In most cases, the individual receiving the pardon was a sympathetic character, practically a victim of a system in need of reform. Think: a woman who kills her abusive husband in self-defense but receives a life sentence because the laws are outdated.

Such individuals must either show evidence of rehabilitation and must be highly unlikely to re-offend.

However, when pardoning people by the thousands, the odds of one or many of them re-offending rise substantially.

The problem isn't the pardons themselves, but rather the attitude that we should release criminals early and often, across the board. Most of the people in prison are there for a reason. Our prisons are filled to overflowing with guilty people. If we decide to soften the law or to release certain non-violent offenders early, that should be the subject of a vote, not an imperial decree by a president who will enjoy armed secret service protection for the rest of his life.