Pubdate: Tue, 29 Jun 2010 Source: Sacramento Bee (CA) Page: 3A Copyright: 2010 The Sacramento Bee Contact: http://www.sacbee.com/2006/09/07/19629/submit-letters-to-the-editor.html Website: http://www.sacbee.com/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/376 Author: Peter Hecht Cited: California NAACP http://www.californianaacp.org/ Cited: Proposition 19 http://www.taxcannabis.org/ Referenced: Targeting Blacks for Marijuana http://mapinc.org/url/btjAQH1v Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/find?115 (Cannabis - California) CALIFORNIA NAACP BACKING OF POT LEGALIZATION OUTRAGES MINISTER The state chapter of the NAACP is endorsing a November ballot initiative to legalize recreational marijuana use and Sacramento minister Ron Allen is furious. Their competing arguments stir debate over which perceived threat is greater for African Americans police exploiting existing marijuana law to target urban minorities or legalized pot endangering youths and communities. In a news conference today, the California State Conference of the NAACP is due to throw its support behind the initiative to legalize marijuana for adults over 21, allow small residential cultivation and permit cities to tax and regulate pot sales. In a statement, Alice Huffman, the state NAACP president, said the organization is backing the initiative, Proposition 19, to counter marijuana arrest rates that she contends unfairly target African Americans. "There is a strong racial component that must be considered when we investigate how marijuana laws are applied to people of color," she said. "The burden has fallen disproportionately on people of color and young black men in particular." But Allen, president of the International Faith-Based Coalition, a Sacramento group representing 3,600 congregations, said he is stunned the state NAACP would favor legalized marijuana. "Most African American pastors are disappointed, absolutely disappointed with the decision," said Allen, bishop of the Greater Solomon Temple Community Church in Oak Park. "If anyone should know the effects of illicit drugs in the black community, it should be one of our most respected civil rights organizations." The endorsement is timed to today's release of a study by the Drug Policy Alliance, a group seeking alternatives to the drug war. Titled "Targeting Blacks for Marijuana," the study uses county arrest statistics to show a higher rate of marijuana possession arrests among African Americans. Stephen Gutwillig, California director of the Drug Policy Alliance, said the state NAACP is "the first mainstream civil rights organization to endorse marijuana legalization. "This represents the expansion of the ... alliance of forces across the political spectrum from the progressive left to the libertarian right that agree we have to junk this disastrous prohibition policy," he said. Roger Salazar, a Democratic consultant working with "Public Safety Now," a group opposing the marijuana initiative said the NAACP endorsement is "unusual." He added: "Reasonable people can argue about the merits of legalization ... But the unintended consequences of this initiative will be a disaster for all California communities." The NAACP endorsement isn't necessarily a harbinger of the African American vote. In 2008, the organization opposed the Proposition 8 ban on same-sex marriage. But African Americans voted overwhelmingly for the initiative.