The New Jim Crow?
There has been much talk over the past decade or two about the paucity of leadership in the African-American community and the silence of what leaders there are about the massive incarceration of blacks in America and its connection to the war on drugs. In New York State for instance some 93% of prisoners doing time for drug offenses are Black or Latino. Knowing that these groups drug use per-capita is about the same as in the White community it’s pretty hard how one can’t see racism in that number yet there has been silence on this from the NAACP and most Black leaders.
We’ve known since H.R. Haldeman’s revealing memoir on his years as Nixon’s chief-of-staff that the war on drugs was used as a tool to exercise control over the African-American community without seeming to do so. As Nixon so shrewdly planned, this tactic apparently worked on the majority of White America. What about the Black leadership though? How could intelligent, politically-savvy black leaders not care that their communities were being devastated by mass incarcerations for the same crimes that Whites generally got probation for? How is it that the NAACP focused on the perceived racial imbalance on TV sitcoms while the constituency it purported to represent languished in prison?
A tiny handful of mid-level Black leaders spoke up but were ignored by the higher-ups. Long-time NAACP National Board member Richard Burton started something called Project Reach that focused on the racial injustice in the drug war but his message was apparently ignored by NAACP leaders. Why?
One possible answer may be found in the history of alcohol prohibition in America. Back in the 1920’s and 30’s immigrant groups such as Italians, Jews, and Germans were heavily involved in the sale, smuggling, and production of alcohol because of the economic opportunities the illegal market provided to them because discrimination prevented them from many legitimate avenues to make a living. Understandably perhaps, these groups were reluctant to speak out against the law for fear of being considered un-American. Since they didn’t want to call attention to themselves for their traditional alcohol use and possibly bring down yet more difficulties on their communities they remained largely silent. If the alcohol prohibition laws were like today’s drug laws and users and small sellers were going to prison for years things might have been different.
Another possibility is that some sort of understanding was reached whereby silence on the drug policy issue would ensure continued social benefits in the form of welfare and other government aid to communities of color.
Whatever the reasons things may be starting to change. With the growing understanding in America that the war on drugs is a failure there are signs that at last the Black community may be ready to speak out about this horrible injustice. There is a new book out called “THE NEW JIM CROW” by Attorney Michelle Alexander. She says “…I wrote this book because I was so deeply alarmed by the relative quiet of the civil rights community and African-American leaders in the face of mass incarceration. And I admit, at the outset, that I, myself, failed to fully grasp the extent of the devastation caused to communities of color as a result of the Drug War. There was a time when I didn’t fully get it.”
Alexander makes a compelling case for the idea that Although Jim Crow laws have been wiped off the books, an astounding percentage of the African American community remains trapped in a subordinate status-much like their grandparents before them.
Another promising sign comes from California where that state’s chapter of the NAACP has endorsed state representative Tom Damiano’s bill to legalize and tax the sale of marijuana in the state. That is a bold step. Still no word from the national NAACP about this issue but a step like this from a major chapter like California’s must have been noticed on high.
It’s a terrible shame that this travesty of justice didn’t get the attention it deserved before a generation or two were hammered mercilessly by this senseless drug policy but, as we see all too often in America, change comes slow.
Obama’s New Drug Control Strategy
President Obama’s long-awaited “new” drug control strategy was released May 10th and I think it was miss-named. It’s neither new nor does it look like it will result in any more “drug control” than past drug control strategies. Let’s take a look at the Executive Summary.
“The Strategy calls for a 15-percent reduction in the rate of youth drug use over 5 years and similar reductions in chronic drug use and drug-related consequences such as drug deaths and drugged driving”. I suppose that shows a slightly more realistic attitude than some past anti-drug strategies that promised “a drug-free America” but just how realistic is it? Part of the new strategy focuses on young people with the idea of preventing drug experimentation before it starts. They intend to accomplish this by promising to “help communities implement evidence-based prevention initiatives” Who decides just what constitutes “evidence-based prevention initiatives”? This administration’s track record on relying on scientific evidence to form policy as promised in the President’s campaign has not been forthcoming. Just one example… How is it that marijuana is Schedule One in the governments Controlled Substances Act list signifying “no medical use” but synthetic marijuana (Marinol) is a legal prescription medication. Is it medicine or isn’t it?
The strategy promises to provide “sound information about the dangers of drug use to young people, their parents, and other caring adults through the National Youth Anti-Drug Media Campaign, at the workplace, and through schools, faith communities, and civic organizations” So far government information on drugs has been largely alarmist and highly selective.
One of the more troubling efforts in the strategy will be a major effort aimed at “ Curtailing drugged driving by encouraging States to establish and enforce laws that impose penalties for the presence of any illicit drug while driving”. The presence of a level of alcohol likely to impair driving may be ascertained by using a breathalyzer but what about other drugs? How can an officer ascertain the presence of tranquilizers? Amphetimines? Does this mean roadside blood tests? What about marijuana? It remains in the body chemistry long after any effects of the drug have dissipated. Testing positive for marijuana does NOT mean you are impaired. Getting impaired drivers off the road sure sounds good and I’m sure it tested well in focus groups but it’s not going to work.
Next covered in the Executive Summary is a section on drug treatment, mostly involving court-ordered programs for those arrested for drug offenses. It calls for increased “screening and early intervention for substance use in all healthcare settings”. Just what will that involve and how will that affect our medical privacy? Will all blood tests include drug screens? It calls for “Improving the quality and evidence base of substance abuse treatment” but that is a difficult area. Data showing the efficacy of drug treatment is far from clear in its indications of what works and what does not. Again… who decides what is scientific evidence? Which “scientific evidence” to believe?
The rest of the strategy focuses on the usual criminal justice efforts to interdict smugglers and growers both here and abroad that have failed so completely for decades. “Maximizing Federal support for law enforcement drug task forces”… “Eliminating high-potency indoor grow labs and marijuana cultivation on public lands”… “Conducting joint counterdrug law enforcement operations with international partners…”… Absolutely nothing new there.
The document closes with the following statement : “The Obama Administration’s National Drug Control Strategy relies on a comprehensive approach, informed by experience and evidence, to reducing drug use and its consequences in the United States The Strategy is a collaborative effort by dozens of departments, agencies, Members of Congress, and the American people…” Accurate when it mentions the “dozens of departments, agencies”, (all of which rely on the continuation of drug prohibition for their funding) “Members of Congress” (who gladly use tough-sounding prohibition rhetoric to get elected), but as for “the American People”… I’m not so sure. Depending on the poll you look at somewhere in the immediate neighborhood of 50% of them support, for example, the complete legalization of marijuana.
It sounds like the administration is treading water until the poll numbers supporting serious change in our drug policy become irrefutable …( 70% perhaps? 80%?) before proposing a strategy that would be good for America. Of course by then we will have wasted several hundred billion dollars and thousands of lives but hey! That’s politics.
A Rehabilitated Prohibitionist
The former director of President George W. Bush’s White House Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives, and the co-author with former Drug Czars Bill Bennett and John Walters of the book “Body Count: Moral Poverty…And How to Win America’s War Against Crime and Drugs” has just come out in favor of medical marijuana and serious consideration of marijuana decriminalization.
A political scientist and criminologist John J. Dilulio Jr. holds a Harvard Ph.D. He is a former professor of politics and public policy at Princeton and former director of the Brookings Institution’s Center for Public Management. He is now a senior fellow of the Manhattan Institute and the Fox Leadership Professor of Politics, Religion, and Civil Society at the University of Pennsylvania. Dilulio has been a proponent of coerced substance-abuse treatment as a way of reducing crime for years and his serious consideration of legalizing marijuana is a surprising turn-around.
The author of an article called ”Let ‘Em Rot,” DiIulio was often cited by conservatives advocating more prisons and longer sentences. “No one - at least, no one in elite policy-wonk circles - is a bigger fan of incarcerating known, adjudicated adult and juvenile criminals than me,” he wrote in a 1996 article for Slate. 1993 book review for The New Republic, he implied that they were getting off too lightly. “It is not unreasonable to argue,” he wrote, “that the problem with the ‘get-tough’ approach of the last twenty-five years is that it hasn’t actually been followed. Despite mandatory sentencing laws, most drug offenders and other felons continue to spend only a fraction of their sentences behind bars.”
Over the years DiIulio has shown that he understands the difference between predatory criminals and non-violent drug offenders. Imprisoning the former reduces crime and protects the public safety. Imprisoning the latter however, just costs a lot of money.
In a recent article in Democracy his prescription for reducing crime addresses marijuana thusly…
“… legalize marijuana for medically prescribed uses, and seriously
consider decriminalizing it altogether. Last year there were more than
800,000 marijuana-related arrests. The impact of these arrests on crime
rates was likely close to zero. There is almost no scientific evidence
showing that pot is more harmful to its users’ health, more of a
“gateway drug,” or more crime-causing in its effects than alcohol or
other legal narcotic or mind-altering substances. Our post-2000 legal
drug culture has untold millions of Americans, from the very young to
the very old, consuming drugs in unprecedented and untested combinations
and quantities. Prime-time commercial television is now a virtual
medicine cabinet (”just ask your doctor if this drug is right for you”).
Big pharmaceutical companies function as all-purpose drug pushers. And
yet we expend scarce federal, state, and local law enforcement resources
waging “war” against pot users. That is insane.”
Well put professor.
Is it Change yet?
This does seem like the time to pick on Obama. The media is full of stories about unfulfilled promises and bungled initiatives. Our foreign policy today is hardly different from Bush’s - we’re still in Iraq and now we’re also in Afghanistan and there’s trouble on the horizon in Yemen. Guantanamo is still open. Our Anti-terrorism policy, according to the New York Times Magazine story a couple of weeks back, is still run largely by Bush appointees and the policy hasn’t changed. The Patriot Act is still here. The health care effort was bungled and now its passage is doubtful. He’s angered the Right and he’s angered the Left just as much. So what about us drug policy reformers?
Typically after a Presidential election US Attorneys appointed under the outgoing administration submit letters of resignation and the new administration replaces many of them with new ones. Well, in the spirit of change Mr. Obama did not accept the resignations of the US Attorneys and appoint his own people. The result? We still have Bush appointees overseeing prosecutions in all of the federal districts. No change in the Justice Department.
With 14 states now having passed medical marijuana laws there has been a demand for some scientific research , done here in the US, into the medical uses of marijuana. Currently the drug is Schedule One - (no medical use, high potential for abuse) and cannot be possessed even for research except for a highly controlled crop of poor quality pot grown in a government-run facility in Mississippi. The only agency with access to that marijuana is The National Institute of Drug Abuse (NIDA) and Shirley Simson, a NIDA spokeswoman told the New York Times recently: “As the National Institute on Drug Abuse, our focus is primarily on the negative consequences of marijuana use. We generally do not fund research focused on the potential beneficial medical effects of marijuana.”
The DEA’s own administrative law judge ruled that NIDA’s monopolization of marijuana research is not in the public interest and ordered the government cannabis be made available to legitimate medical researchers, not just NIDA.
Former DEA Deputy Administrator Michele Leonhart chose to ignore the DEA’s own administrative law judge’s ruling.
So who did Obama pick last week to be the new head of the DEA? Bush-era appointee Michele Leonhart. No change at the DEA.
Before his election, when he was seen by many as the bringer of serious drug policy reform Obama told the Washington Post “Promoting science isn’t just about providing resources - it’s also about protecting free and open inquiry. It’s about letting scientists like those who are here today do their jobs, free from manipulation or coercion, and listening to what they tell us,, even when it’s inconvenient - especially when it’s inconvenient.”
Back in May of last year, after some awful comments by the Presidents new Drug Czar Gil Kerlikowski and his laughing at and dismissing the number one most popular question to come to his own website (Remember that?) I wrote on this blog that “For drug policy reform advocates it looks like the honeymoon with Obama is quickly coming to a close.” Now I think we can safely say the honeymoon is over.
Ignorance of the Law is No Excuse
If you are arrested for doing something you didn’t realize was against the law the judge will often tell you that “ignorance of the law is no excuse”. Knowing the law as it applies to activities you engage in is important for every citizen. If you drive, you need to know the traffic laws. If you own a bar you need to know the liquor laws. And, if you are one of the tens of millions of Americans who smoke marijuana, you need to know the marijuana laws.
Marijuana is a “Schedule One” drug according to the Federal government. That means there is no permissible use allowed for any purpose whatsoever, medical or otherwise. However Federal agents don’t typically go after individual users of marijuana; their resources are limited and they concentrate on bigger selling and smuggling operations and leave the small stuff to state and local police so here in New York State you need to know the state laws.
Back in the early 1970’s New York passed its infamous Rockefeller Drug Laws that imposed tremendous penalties for possession or sale of any illegal drug. Within a couple of years the politicians realized that large numbers of white youth, many in college and the children of their well-connected constituents, were getting sentenced to many years in prison for marijuana offenses so in 1977 they removed marijuana from the Rockefeller Drug Laws. They decriminalized personal possession of up to slightly under an ounce as long as it was not in public view or burning. That law still stands today.
If you have less than 25 grams of marijuana in your possession and you are not selling it or smoking it and it is not in public view (e.g. In you pocket, glove compartment, or sock drawer) the maximum fine is $100. and, it is a violation-level offense like a parking ticket.. no arrest, no criminal record. If, however, you are caught smoking it or waving it around on the street it is “in public view” and it becomes a misdemeanor, which is a crime and you can be arrested and get a criminal record.
So why does New York City lead the nation in marijuana arrests if New York State decriminalized personal possession over thirty years ago? Queens College sociology professor Harry Levine looked into this and here’s what he found. A typical scenario may occur as follows: Officers approach a group of people talking, perhaps on their porch or stoop and ask if any of them has anything on them that they shouldn’t have. They say that if they search them and find drugs things will go worse for them , they’ll be arrested so why not just let us see what you have now. Usually someone ignorant of New York States marijuana laws will remove some small amount of marijuana from his pocket figuring it’s no big deal. Well… it wasn’t a big deal as long as it remained in his pocket but now, by showing it to the officer it has moved “into the public view” and is a misdemeanor. Out come the cuffs and an arrest is made.
Even if the officers had searched him chances are the search would not have stood up in court and the charge dismissed. Officers have the right to “pat down” someone to feel for weapons but a thorough search of pockets requires probable cause which they didn’t have. There is no way that a joint or a small baggie of marijuana would feel like a gun or a knife. Voluntarily showing the marijuana to the officer however made the criminal charge possible.
What’s in it for the police? Levine’s sources in the NYPD say there are many benefits for them:
“Narcotics and patrol police, their supervisors, and top commanders in the police department benefit from the marijuana possession arrests. The arrests are comparatively safe, allow officers and their supervisors to accrue overtime pay, and produce arrest numbers that show productivity. When needed, commanders can temporarily shift narcotics police off making the misdemeanor possession arrests and assign them to other duties, which provides considerable flexibility. The marijuana arrests are also the most effective means available for obtaining information (including fingerprints, photographs, and potentially DNA samples) from people never before entered in the criminal justice databases.”
That may be nice for the police but for the arrestees getting busted is not only humiliating, expensive, annoying, and embittering; it gives them a criminal record that can hamper their educational and employment prospects for the rest of their lives. Protect yourself. Remember… ignorance of the law is no excuse.
