In the wake of the questionable shootings of Keith Lamont Scott in North Carolina and Terence Crutcher in Oklahoma, activists are renewing calls for police reform. Some writers (including a contributor to the Nation) are calling for the complete abolition of police forces in the United States. Calls for abolition may seem extreme to the outside listener. This makes sense, given the word’s use to denote the complete and total elimination of the institution in question, and the worry of having a lack of protection. But the call for this radical form of justice makes sense as a way to dismantle...