Pubdate: Wed, 12 Jun 2013
Source: Salina Journal, The (KS)
Copyright: 2013 The Salina Journal
Contact:  http://www.saljournal.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/1752
Author: Ben Wearing

WHERE WE'RE HEADING

When Jack Cole, executive director of the Law Enforcement Against 
Prohibition, or LEAP, spoke several years ago in Salina, he claimed 
the nation's drug laws were based on racism.

Cole should know. He started as a police officer in 1970, the year 
the war on drugs was started by the Nixon administration. Cole, who 
spent years as a drug agent, said the drug war gave Nixon a way to 
target blacks to win over frightened white voters.

Forty-three years later, an ACLU analysis of crime data would seem to 
support Cole's contention. An Associated Press story in the June 5 
Journal on the ACLU study showed that, nationwide, blacks are 
arrested at a higher rate than whites, even though marijuana use by 
both races is about the same.

We're generally suspicious of studies put out by groups hoping to 
sway public opinion, but if the numbers are anywhere near accurate, 
then they're disturbing. Marijuana use by blacks nationally is 13.7 
percent; whites 11.6 percent. Yet, blacks are arrested at a rate of 
716 per 100,000, while whites are arrested at 192 per 100,000.

In one county in Alabama, where blacks make up 12 percent of the 
population, all those arrested for marijuana possession were black. 
In another Alabama county, 37 percent are black, and again all those 
arrested were black.

Kansas is one of the states where blacks are arrested at a rate of 
more than four times greater than that of whites.

The consequences of being arrested, as Cole noted during his visit to 
Salina, are serious.

"You can get over an addiction, but you can't get over a conviction," 
Cole said.

The answer here is not better policing, although that certainly would 
help. When Cole spoke in Salina, he figured the drug war would be 
over in 10 years. There's your answer.

Because of unequal law enforcement, because of lives ruined by drug 
convictions and for so many other reasons, as we did with 
Prohibition, it's time to declare victory and move on.

- -- Ben Wearing
- ---
MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom