The changes were backed by conservative groups that have taken up the mantle of prison reform

FOR nearly 20 years, Louisiana has held an unwanted title: the top state incarcerator in the country that imprisons a greater share of its citizens than any other. The competition often hasn’t even been particularly close, with Louisiana keeping well over 800 residents out of every 100,000 behind bars—nearly 1% of its people. In most recent years, no other state has topped 700.

But Louisiana will soon relinquish this crown. Sometime in the next year or so, experts expect the title to pass to Oklahoma, where in recent years the incarceration rate has skyrocketed (and which, not coincidentally, locks up a greater share of women than any other state).

Both states recently concluded legislative sessions where criminal justice reforms aimed at reducing mass incarceration were near the top of the agenda. But Oklahoma’s effort mostly failed, while Louisiana’s was largely successful.

The package of 10 new laws passed in the state is expected to cut the inmate rolls by about a tenth over the next decade, according to the Pew Charitable Trust, a nonprofit that helped with research on the bills. The reduction will mostly be accomplished through more lenient sentencing practices: reducing mandatory minimums, less stiff sentences for drug crimes, and making inmates eligible for parole earlier in their prison stints. About 70% of the savings will be put into programmess aimed at helping crime victims and rehabilitating criminals so they don’t re-offend.

De-incarceration has long been a hobby horse of the left, which deplores America’s outlier status; the country has incarceration rates nearly 10 times those of Western Europe. This year’s reforms had the enthusiastic backing of Louisiana’s Democratic governor, John Bel Edwards, who comes from a family of sheriffs and thus enjoys more support in the state’s law enforcement community than many Democrats.

But the real key to the success of the package was the backing of groups on the political right, including the state’s biggest business lobby and the Louisiana Family Forum, a Christian outfit that pushes for “family values” legislation. This mirrors national trends, with influential conservatives like the Koch brothers digging deep into their pockets to spread the gospel of reducing prison populations—a way to shrink government and, potentially, provide a bigger workforce. Roughly a decade ago, Texas became the first red state to readjust its attitudes to crime and punishment, a move many other states have since emulated.

Oklahoma is a bit of a latecomer in seeking to follow what is now a fairly well-trod path. Just like Louisiana, Oklahoma had a package of bills that had been blessed by a blue-ribbon group of stakeholders, as well as the governor. Unlike Louisiana, there were no partisan overtones; the Republicans control the statehouse and the governor’s office. Nonetheless, most of the bills got killed in a committee led by a former prosecutor.

Unless Oklahoma lawmakers come around in a future session, Mary Fallin, the governor, has warned that the state’s prison population will grow by a quarter over the next decade which, combined with Louisiana’s anticipated reduction, would put the Sooner State in a class by itself.

How does being No. 2 sound to Mr Edwards, Louisiana’s governor? It isn't great, but he’ll take it. The passage of the bills “demonstrates that we can find bipartisanship and collaboration” on difficult issues, he said. That spirit has been difficult to find elsewhere: Louisiana began a special legislative session a half-hour after its regular one ended last month because lawmakers, for the first time in 17 years, couldn’t pass a budget.