123 Outline

1
12/3 Outline

• Drug Policy
• Historical Perspective (boring but necessary -
  sorry!)
• The good news do not need to know details for
  quiz!
• The less good news need to know BIG picture
• The Goode Text Ch.13
• Components of Current Drug Policy
• Legalization Issue
• The third path?

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Drug Policy Historical Perspective

• 1791 First drug law Congress passed an
  excise tax on whiskey which led to the Whiskey
  Rebellion
• mid-late 1800s increase in Chinese immigrants
  increased opium availability, use spread rapidly
• 1875 San Francisco Act first US ordinance
  forbidding opium smoking
• 1882 passed in New York, then soon after in most
  other states
• 1856 hypodermic needle introduced morphine used
  extensively in the Civil War, led to soldiers
  disease

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Drug Policy Historical Perspective (continued)

• Cocaine also became available at about the same
  time
• 1906 Pure Foods and Drug Act T. Roosevelt.
  Prohibited interstate commerce in adulterated or
  misbranded foods and drugs. Focus on labeling,
  not content
• 1914 Harrison Act required registration and
  fees for sellers (e.g., physicians), importers of
  heroin, opium, cocaine. Nothing to prohibit an
  individual from possessing or using drugs
  (probably would have been deemed unconstitutional
  by Supreme Court)

4
Drug Policy Historical Perspective (continued)

• In 1914 estimated that about 200,000 Americans
  (about 1 in 400) were addicted to opium or other
  opiate drug
• Court case Dr. Webb was prescribing opiates
  for patients he never saw prosecuted convicted.
  Led to many more physician prosecutions
• Cure clinics shut down by government
• Between 1919-1929 75,000 people arrested for
  drug violations

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Drug Policy Historical Perspective (continued)

• With legal route to getting drug shut down,
  addicts turned to illegal
• 1922 Jones-Miller Act increased penalty for
  illegally importing or selling narcotics (10 yr
  prison term) and included for the first time,
  that illegal possession was sufficient evidence.
  Addict as Criminal!
• By 1928 drug law violators made up 1/3 of
  prison population
• 1929 Too expensive, so govt decided to try to
  cure addicts rather than lock them up

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Drug Policy Historical Perspective (continued)

• Anslinger first drug czar, 1932-1962
• Opposed outpatient treatment
• Led the 1937 Marijuana Tax Act
• 1956 mandatory sentencing. Death penalty for
  anyone selling heroin to underage person.
• 1970 Comprehensive Drug Abuse Prevention and
  Control Act
• 1988 first law to include any provision for
  demand reduction! (important point)

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Current Drug Policy

• Drug use deemed a problem, laws enacted
• Inherent in laws are assumptions about drug use,
  and abuse
• How can we predict what influence drug laws will
  have on behavior?
• Should there be laws at all?
• Where do people stand?
• 1995 Gallup poll
• legalize all drugs - 9 favor, 5 strongly
• make criminal penalties more severe - 49
  strongly favor, 35 favor.
• mandatory drug testing in workplace - 70 favor
  or strongly favor
• Large majorities favor more police both here and
  abroad to fight war

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Current Drug Policy

• Eliminate the source
• Shore up the borders against imported drugs
• Punish citizens (e.g., mandatory prison sentences
  for possession, selling, importing)
• What are issues involved with each facet of the
  policy?

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Eliminate the source

• Must understand how deeply entrenched drug
  cultivation is in some countries
• e.g., Nixons attempt to get Turkey to stop
  growing opium and switch to wheat and barely
• Profits
• Other countries willing to step in
• e.g., Marijuana in Mexico (early 1980s)
• Colombia and Jamaica picked up slack

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Eliminate the Source (cont)

• shutdowns in other countries can also stimulate
  domestic production (e.g., 50 of marijuana
  consumed in US is domestic)
• Production occurs on small scale in many
  different countries
• Designer drugs (synthetic) have increased
• After 2 decades of the war on drugs,, in the
  US, heroin and cocaine are readily available,
  cheap(er), and more pure than before war was
  declared. (remember idea of innovation?)

11
Border control

• Marginally more successful than eliminating drugs
  at source
• Difficulty is the needle in the haystack
  problem
• 100 million tons of legal freight into US each
  year
• Must locate approx. 10 tons of heroin, and 120
  tons of cocaine
• Appox a quarter-billion border crossings into US
• In Drug Wars film remember how much drug dealer
  could afford to lose and still profit
• Bottom line this is ridiculous

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Punitive Policies

• Between 1970 and 1995, the number of prison
  inmates increased by factor of 5
• Sentences served are closer to those given (for
  all crimes)
• Drug convictions much more likely to result in
  incarceration
• The huge profit motive creates situation where
  drug dealers are willing to risk arrest
• One argument current drug laws have done most
  for the major dealers by driving the prices up,
  increasing profits even more

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The Legalization Issue

• Pro
• Why drug war failed?
• Overreliance on criminal justice
• Ideologically wedded to abstinence only treatment
• Insulated from a cost/benefit analysis
• What is needed?
• A policy that accepts that drugs are here to stay
  and we need to learn how to deal with them
• Reduction of crime and misery caused by both drug
  use and prohibitionist policy
• Common sense, public health, human rights

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Terminology

• Decriminalization removal of criminal penalties
  for possession
• 11 states have for marijuana
• Makes possession of small quantities of marijuana
  a misdemeanor similar to a traffic violation (no
  criminal record, no court appearance, etc)
• Legalization a set of rules in which state plays
  critical role
• e.g., sale of alcohol and state controls who can
  buy it, where, etc.
• Crucial differences
• State receives revenue from legalization
• State also pays costs associated with
  implementing laws from legalization

15
Politics?

• Surprisingly, legalization issue does not always
  parallel political ideology
• For instance, pro-legalization
• William F. Buckley
• Milton Friedman
• George Shultz
• Several political scientists and economists who
  are traditionally conservative
• Still, generally speaking, conservatives tend to
  support punitive model and liberals tend to
  support other measures

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Assumptions of legalization

• 1. Drug use and abuse would not rise much under
  legalization
• Core assumptions about people
• Rational, intelligent, majority will not put
  themselves at risk
• Lustful, hedonistic, will engage in dangerous
  behavior if given chance
• Since illegal drugs are so easy to get, everyone
  who currently wants to use drugs is doing so
• Each society has a stable proportion of abusers
• e.g., alcohol no matter how available, 10 of US
  drinkers will develop problems with their use
• Also, benefits to society of decreased crime,
  etc, is worth a small increase in abusers

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Assumptions of legalization (continued)

• 2. Currently used illegal drugs are not as
  harmful as legal drugs
• Remember tobacco and alcohol kill about 550,000
  people a year
• All other drugs, approximately 25,000 deaths/year
• Is this due to danger of drug, or the more
  common use of the drug?
• 3. Current control policies do not work
• Actually increase profits and have made drug
  pushing more competitive, and drugs more potent
  (less bulky, easier to smuggle)
• Without profit motive, crime would disappear

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Is legalization a viable option?

• Need to differentiate among drugs
• Marijuana versus heroin?
• Will use rise?
• Use of alcohol DID decrease during Prohibition
• Decline in alcohol use when legal age changed
  from 18 to 21
• Vietnam veterans demonstrated extreme rates of
  use when in an environment where drug was legal
  and readily available
• Stress factor?
• Higher rate of drug abuse among physicians who
  have ready access

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The third path?

• Containment and Harm reduction
• Keep drugs illegal (but decriminalize marijuana?)
• Do not arrest for possession
• Send users, addicts, street dealers to treatment
• Focus on demand reduction and drug education
• Take military out of war
• Stop trying to stop at source (too much money
• More money into treatment
• Needle exchanges
• Increase controls on tobacco products, eliminate
  all advertising
• Stop dreaming of a drug-free America