Pubdate: Wed, 04 Oct 2000
Source: News-Sentinel (IN)
Copyright: 2000 The News-Sentinel
Contact:  600 West Main Street, Fort Wayne, IN 46802
Website: http://www.news-sentinel.com/ns/index.shtml
Author: Leo Morris, for the editorial board

WILL COMMON-SENSE DRUG POLICY WORK?

There are four principles we frequently use elsewhere in our republic.

One of the people who responded to a recent interactive editorial about 
America's war on drugs threw out an interesting challenge. "What sort of 
drug policy," asked Vera Bradova, "would a constitutional rationalist with 
libertarian tendencies (the editorial page editor's self-described 
philosophy) support?"

Well, let's try.

Most of us might agree on a few common-sense principles that are applied 
fairly regularly in our republic: 1. What people do to themselves is not 
properly the concern of "society." 2. People are responsible for their 
behavior, and it IS society's business when those actions harm others. 3. 
We have a special obligation to protect our children. 4. Public policy 
(including taxation) can and sometimes should seek to influence individual 
behavior.

But can we apply that common sense to drug policy, or are we too irrational 
about the subject? Using those principles, we might some day come up with 
something like:

1. End the war on drugs. All it's doing is creating a band of almost 
untouchable, filthy rich multinational criminals, filling our jails with 
people who shouldn't be there and making corruption too lucrative for many 
public officials to pass up. People have always ingested substances that 
can cause them harm. Why single out one kind of unapproved drug when 
alcohol and tobacco do far more harm to individuals and society than all 
the illegal ones combined?

2. But strengthen and make absolute the penalties when people cross the 
line into behavior that harms others. Make sure all laws are clearly 
understood, the punishment concretely defined. Then uphold those laws -- 
each time, all the time -- whether the contributing factor was alcohol, 
cocaine or just a bad attitude.

3. Make the law especially tough on criminals who prey on children. Anyone 
who enables a child to experiment with dangerous drugs goes to jail, the 
first time for a long time. The prison sentence for a second offense would 
be so long that there would be no third offense. No plea bargains. No parole.

4. Use the state's power to regulate when, where and how such substances 
are sold and to whom, just as we now do with alcohol and tobacco. Use the 
state's ability to educate to discourage drug abuse, the way we have made 
drunken-driving less acceptable and greatly reduced smoking. And tax the 
drugs the way alcohol and tobacco are now -- it makes sense to collect such 
funds if we are going to use them more wisely than we do now.

Those are the broad strokes, thrown out for discussion. What should the 
details be? Are there any of the four you disagree with? Even if you do, 
isn't this overall approach worth considering, given how much time, effort 
and money have been wasted on the present course?
- ---
MAP posted-by: Keith Brilhart