Is It Time To End The War On Drugs?

America is now involved in three or four undeclared foreign wars (depending on how you count). But America's longest war still goes on. In 1971, President Richard Nixon went on national television to declare that if we didn't destroy the drug menace, it would surely destroy us.

Since then, the number of dead, dying and injured, along with armed clashes on both sides of the Mexican border may not be a war, but it certainly looks a lot like one. If we take the favorite expression of the left regarding war--"quagmire"--this makes our other wars, including the current ones, look like a brief walk in the park. Every once in awhile, a conservative writer will argue that the war has been lost. Most recently from my perspective is an article from an old occasional ally, occasional nemesis Debra Saunders at the San Francisco Chronicle. Her June 12 article was entitled "At Least 4 Good Reasons To End the War on Drugs."

As one observer of war said: "Every war plan is perfect, until the shooting starts." That seems to apply to the war on drugs. Nixon's original proposal was for $155 million federal dollars in anti-drug funding, but set aside $115 million of that sum "solely for the treatment and rehabilitation of drug-addicted individuals." Saunders used some of the standard arguments for ending the war on drugs, but to start with, she does point out that drug use is up, 118 million Americans have used illegal drugs, and the cost of prosecuting the drug war and offenders continues to mount.

I am most definitely not an advocate for drug legalization. But Saunders's article got me thinking that the states seem to be much better at handling their drug problems than the federal government. Drug use and abuse is neither monolithic nor the same from state to state. Federal assistance in preventing drug importation may be a great deal more useful in the border states than in the interior states. We now have at least three Presidents who have hinted at or admitted to drug use themselves, though naturally they wouldn't touch the stuff now. Leaving the drug war to the federal government alone is an exercise in unthinking silliness.

Since its inception at the federal level, the war on drugs has produced 900,000 criminally-active gang members representing more than 20,000 gangs devoted exclusively to mid-level and retail drug distribution. The federal government is best at handling the top-level wholesalers, importers and cartels, but usage and abuse of drugs happens locally, a matter best handled by the states. The drug-related crime rate in DC itself is a pretty good indication of how bereft of good ideas the federal authorities actually are. And the federal government dictates terms to the states which result in some very odd results.

Most recently, the US Supreme Court ordered the release of a huge number of California prison inmates because of overcrowding. Yet a sizable percentage of those "overcrowded" prisoners are in prison in the first place for possession and/or use of illegal drugs. But if California wants those federal funds for its law enforcement divisions, it has to adhere to the draconian drug laws set out in the 1986 Anti-Drug Abuse Act, including mandatory minimum sentences. Very little wiggle room is left for the states to use alternate means of dealing with drug abusers. Legalization is not the answer, but look at California to see what happens if you send them all "up the river" for lengthy periods of time.

One of the arguments in favor of legalizing recreational drug use is that it will produce a net gain in government revenue received. That is hard to prove, but if all states are required to adhere to the same rules, we'll never know. Harvard economist Jeffrey Miron says that in 2008 legalizing drugs would have saved federal, state and local authorities $44 billion per year while bringing in $33 billion if the drugs were taxed. Sounds good, but how can that be proven as long as the federal government holds a tight rein on the states' ability to "get creative" with mixed prosecution, diversion, treatment and alternate forms of detention? As it currently stands, those figures are simply pulled out of a hat.

Worst of all, those advocating legalization use facts and figures almost entirely related to marijuana in order to avoid discussing the far more serious societal problems caused by use of hard drugs. They also bring up individual rights, as if use of cocaine or heroin is a "right" comparable to having a few too many beers on a hot Sunday afternoon. But as long as the federal government determines which drugs could be safely decriminalized in order to alleviate enforcement and incarceration problems, we'll never be able to test what works and what doesn't. It's also important to note that decriminalization and legalization are not the same thing.

California and thirteen other states have made simple possession of small amounts of marijuana an "infraction" (not a crime) which does not allow the user to go scot-free. Eventually, a youthful infraction can be expunged from the public record, and there's no public criminal record to follow the youthful mistake into responsible adulthood. Former Baltimore narcotics cop Neill Franklin says: "President Obama needs to think about where he would be right now had he been caught with drugs as a young black man. It's probably not in the Oval Office, so why does he insist on ramping up a drug war that needlessly churns other young black men through the criminal justice system?" I am the last person to use the word "racism" loosely, but there has traditionally been a strong racial element in prosecution of drug sales and use, particularly in the matter of crack cocaine versus powder cocaine.

I come away from Saunders's recitation of facts and figures with a different conclusion from hers. She appears to be ready to surrender and declare a victory. But that doesn't seem like the right conclusion to be drawn. Perhaps it is simply that the war is being micromanaged from Washington DC instead of leaving the daily decisions on how, when and where to fight to the field commanders (the states). Policy wonks and elected politicians far from the battlefield are not the best people to be deciding how to handle the daily logistics of fighting a war with numerous fronts.

Perhaps the federal government could stick to enforcing interstate and intercontinental drug manufacturing and transport law, and loosen up the rules restricting the states from considering, writing and enforcing their own drug laws, including which drugs remain forbidden and which are decriminalized or even legalized. It wouldn't be an easy transition, and there would be many problems. Some states would opt to retain rigid drug laws exactly as they are today. Others would likely modify the rules, decriminalize certain drugs and regulate their use, while others would go off the deep end and legalize pretty much everything. But those decisions would be back in the hands of the people instead of distant federal legislators, "experts," czars and bureaucrats. It would finally transform theory into practice, allowing us to see if any theory other than rigid prohibition and enforcement would lower the human and financial toll of the war.

Before the federal leviathan swallowed up the prerogatives and rights guaranteed by the Tenth Amendment to the Constitution, the states were known as the crucibles of experimentation and inventiveness. It could turn out that the federal war on drugs is the right one, but we will never be able to be sure if there is another way so long as the states are forbidden to do that experimentation.

We have touched on this subject in the past, directly and indirectly. To review those articles, go to our Index, and click on "drugs."