The War on Drugs: One of Americas Greatest Failures. Nows the time to admit we were wrong.
by Corey Owens
It is relatively easy to make claims that the United States government is waging war on its own people. It was claimed during Prohibition, the Vietnam War, and now the War on Terror. However, it is in most all instances a significantly more difficult endeavor to prove that we are the victims. But as with most rules the exception begs one to reconsider the rule itself. The War on Drugs forgotten by most during this time of wars against Iraq, Afghanistan, terror, and poverty is wasting more time, energy, and money today than it ever has before. With the founding of the Bureau of Narcotics and Dangerous Drugs in 1968 began what may prove to be the most protracted and expensive war upon which this country has ever embarked. While the medical marijuana initiatives passed by several states might give one faith in the democratic process they are a far cry from what is needed and sufficiently justified at this juncture: an end to the War on Drugs.
The War on Drugs, officially declared by President Nixon in 1971, was the brainchild of a crafty Nixon campaign aide who realized that public sentiment was moving away from acceptance of drug use as a backlash to the 1960s counterculture. Just one year prior to Nixons declaration, only 16.3% of federal prison inmates were there on drug charges, most of them violent offenders or involved in mid-level distribution or production. According to the Office of National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP), by 1998 nearly 59% of the federal prison population was incarcerated on drug charges. It might be hoped that since the federal anti-drug budget has increased from $.1 billion in 1970 to $17.7 billion in 2000 that the increase in drug-related sentences is a reflection of major success in combating the abuse of illegal drugs. Unfortunately, this couldnt be much further from the truth. While federal survey results do reflect a general decrease in drug use (14.1% of the general population in 1979 to 6.2% in 1998) two factors discourage celebrating this decrease as a success. First, most estimates (including those made by the ONDCP) suggest that any decrease in use has been mostly among casual marijuana users fearful of arrest and prosecution, while the number of hardcore users of opiates, methamphetamine, and cocaine seem to have increased steadily over the past thirty years. Second, as the National Research Council pointed out in a 2001 report, the increasing stigma against drug use has likely resulted in far fewer survey respondents admitting to any drug use, let alone hardcore use.
The report concludes that better indicators of drug use trends are overdose deaths and emergency room mentions of drugs. These numbers have escalated consistently since the 1980s, and both are at record highs. With more deaths resulting from hardcore drug use one might expect that the ONDCP would be working diligently to encourage education and treatment. And one would be wrong. In 2002 the ONDCP reported that 32.5% of the federal anti-drug budget went to treatment and education, down from 58% in 1970. Even more discouraging, a study by the Rand Corporation in 2000 offered a seething indictment of the ONDCPs accounting practices, accusing that the reported education and treatment budgets are inflated by as much as 20%. These numbers are especially disturbing considering the cost-effectiveness of education and treatment. According to a report from the Drug Policy Research Center, domestic enforcement costs 4 times as much as treatment for a given amount of user reduction, 7 times as much for consumption reduction, and 15 times as much for societal cost reduction.
Instead of allocating funds to programs that work (treatment programs, preventative education, addiction counseling, etc.) the federal government has seen it fit to pump billions of dollars into a system of enforcement that has done less than nothing. Not only has hardcore use increased since 1968, the War on Drugs has spurred a general distrust of the police and courts in many communities. This distrust is not unfounded. For one, Whites comprise nearly three-quarters of drug users in the United States, but make up only 21% of imprisoned drug offenders at the state level. The racial disparities are evident at all stages of the enforcement system, ranging from arrest and conviction rates to length of sentences and time served. The statistics that consider income level are equally staggering. The privileges stemming from being White and wealthy are seldom more apparent than when observing the workings of the War on Drugs.
President Abraham Lincoln once famously stated that prohibition goes beyond the bounds of reason in that it attempts to control a man's appetite by legislation and makes crimes out of things that are not crimes. A prohibition law strikes a blow at the very principles upon which our government was founded. More than thirty years later the United States has little to show for the tens of billions of dollars it has spent combating the use illegal narcotics. It is time to acknowledge the facts: America is waging war on its own citizens. The War on Drugs is a war on racial minorities, the impoverished, civil liberties, and common sense. Ultimately, the War on Drugs is a war on all of us. The War on Drugs was a mistake in 1971 and its a mistake now. Its time to admit we were wrong.
