Almost 1% of our population is serving time in prison. This is 5 times the number that we incarcerated in 1980. The United States has 5% of the world’s population and yet, maintains 25% of the world’s inmates. Of those in prison, an estimated 60% are in for drug offenses.
The “War on Drugs” was begun by Richard Nixon in 1971. He increased the size and scope of drug agencies and law enforcement, and had marijuana listed temporarily as a Scedule One drug. When he appointed a commission led by Republican Pennsylvania Governor Raymond Shafer to review that listing, the commission unanimously recommended that marijuana be decriminalized. Nixon ignored the recommendation and marijuana remains to this day a Schedule One substance, along with heroin, cocaine, methamphetamine, and LSD. He also forwarded mandatory sentencing guidelines and authorized “no-knock” warrants.
In the 1980s, the drug war became one of the main emphases of the Reagan administration. It was the signature project for First Lady Nancy Reagan, who coined the slogan “Just Say No”. From 1980 – 2000, the number of people incarcerated for nonviolent drug offenses rose from 50,000 to almost 500,000 US citizens. Today, we spend more than $50 Billion annually on the war on drugs.
Interestingly, the first of the modern day private correctional institutions was opened a short time after Mrs. Reagan took the reins of the anti-drug campaign. It was a facility in Hamilton County, Tennessee, taken over in 1984 by the Corrections Corporation of America (CCA). Today, over 8% of incarcerated prisoners serve time in privately-owned, for-profit correctional institutions. How provident it was for private corporations that our incarceration levels begin multiplying at the very time we began allowing prisons for profit in the US. And is it profitable? We do save some money on the running of the prisons by privatizing them. But by incarcerating citizens in the first place, we remove them from the tax rolls, we impoverish their families, and we relegate them to a post-prison future of low wages and job disqualification because of their felonies. Can’t we do better as an advanced society by reducing the number of non-violent offenders in our prisons and treating our sick addicts? Should we be incentivizing our public and private sectors to create criminals by having prisons which make some people wealthy off the labors of prisoners? This more truly sounds like something out of a dark Dickens novel than it does modern day America.
Fast forward now to 2001 and the relatively poor and conservative Catholic country of Portugal. The prison system in Portugal was burgeoning with drug addicts and the rate of recidivism equally high. HIV infection from shared needles and addicted prostitutes was a growing concern of epidemic proportions. So, the government, against the wishes of the conservative constituency, moved to decriminalize all illicit drugs and instead of incarcerating addicts, offered drug treatment. A 2009 article in Time entitled Drugs in Portugal: Did Decriminalization Work? indicates that the program has been a resounding success, lowering addiction rates, costs, and rates of HIV infection. Drug addicts were immediately brought out of the shadows and into the light of society where their illnesses could be treated. Those convicted of drug use “…are sent to a panel consisting of a psychologist, social worker and legal adviser for appropriate treatment (which may be refused without criminal punishment), instead of jail.” The lower cost of law enforcement has been diverted instead to drug abatement programs. In Portugal today, 10% of students 15 and under have tried marijuana. In the US, over 39% of students 12 and under have tried it, according to the Cato Institute, a Libertarian think tank. Follow the Time link below for many more impressive statistics regarding the success of this quantum change in Portuguese society and ideology regarding addiction and drug use.
It’s time we recognized that the war on drugs is lost in its present form. Arresting, incarcerating, and ruining the lives of drug addicts and their families does nothing positive for our society. Exacerbating the problem by creating a prison industry based on profit made from prisoners encourages lawmakers to continue the status quo, especially as the private prison corporations’ lobbies continue to grow and strengthen.
The war should change from a war on drugs to a war on disease/addiction. We should take a serious look at following Portugal’s lead to decriminalize drugs, release nonviolent drug offenders from our prisons, and stop necessitating the need to incarcerate our citizens to fulfill our promises to private corporations running prisons for profit. There is no profit to our society in jailing our citizens.
Sources:
http://www.naacp.org/pages/criminal-justice-fact-sheet
http://www.drugwarfacts.org/cms/Prisons_and_Drugs#sthash.sJObs6Ey.dpbs
http://www.drugpolicy.org/new-solutions-drug-policy/brief-history-drug-war
http://content.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,1893946,00.html
An Unrepresented American 