AG'S EFFORT TO REVISE SENTENCING RULE FOILED

Senate Democrats rejected Attorney General Michael Mukasey's request
to roll back sentencing guidelines that would enable thousands of
prisoners to seek reductions in sentences for crack-cocaine
convictions. Mukasey asked Congress to alter the U.S. Sentencing
Commission's directive, effective March 3, that would allow for the
reduction requests. The directive could flood courts with requests
from thousands of violent criminals, the Justice Department says.

Sen. Edward Kennedy, D-Mass., called Mukasey's concerns a "scare
tactic." Federal law comes down harder on crack violations than
powder-cocaine violations. Kennedy says that amounts to
discrimination because more blacks are arrested for crack violations.
The Sentencing Commission adopted the harsher sentence in the 1980s
in response to a crack epidemic.