They are responsible for minimum sentencing laws:

http://www.thewire.com/politics/2014/04/a-timeline-of-the-ri...

> June 19, 1986: College basketball player Len Bias dies of a cocaine overdose, which highly politicized the drug debate during a mid-term election year, as Frontline explains. In 1999, Eric Sterling, a former lawyer for the House Judiciary Committee would go on to explain to This American Life how Democrats, in an effort to recover from their soft on crime reputation, pushed through a drug bill that introduced mandatory minimum sentences.

http://www.thisamericanlife.org/radio-archives/episode/143/s...

No, nor have they historically been more likely to oppose mandatory minimum sentencing guidelines. See http://www.amazon.com/First-Civil-Right-Political-Developmen...

Also, big disclaimer, the author of the aforementioned book and I dated for four years.