Pubdate: Tue, 08 Nov 2005
Source: Intelligencer Journal (PA)
Copyright: 2005 Lancaster Newspapers, Inc.
Contact:  http://www.lancnews.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/211
Author: Lou Sessinger

SHOULD THE GOVERNMENT END ITS WAR ON DRUGS?

Peter J. Christ's argument is an old one but one that still warrants a debate.

The former police officer and co-founder of Law Enforcement Against 
Prohibition took his message to the Warminster Rotary Club last week.

He thinks our nation's War on Drugs should end because it's an 
unwinnable waste of money and police resources.

If the possession and use of illegal drugs were decriminalized, he 
argues, the drug business could be taken out of the control of 
criminals and put under the control of the authorities.

Money that now goes to enforcing the drug laws could then be diverted 
to drug addiction treatment and education.

Some people think that, if we gave robbers and murderers the drugs 
they crave, they'd stop robbing and murdering the rest of us to get them.

That might sound logical, but I question the soundness of the logic.

More addicts might get into treatment programs, but might not the 
easy availability of drugs create more addicts who otherwise might 
not have become addicted?

Can society afford to support a class of drug-addled addicts who are 
unable to work or lead productive lives because of their impairment?

We've been down that road before.

America didn't begin to prohibit drugs until the late 19th century, 
and at first the only drug banned was opium.

The prevailing attitude was that the government had no right to 
regulate what citizens put into their bodies, and numerous medicines 
containing drugs like morphine, heroin and cocaine could be purchased 
legally at any drug store or through the mail.

You could order a hypodermic syringe from the Sears catalogue, and 
nobody knows for certain how many American men and women were addicts.

But drugs began to be regulated when the social problems their 
widespread use created became visible - increases in domestic 
violence, broken families, poverty and crime.

Proponents of drug legalization often point to the Netherlands.

Possession of controlled drugs, including marijuana, is illegal in 
the Netherlands, but the Dutch have a different attitude.

Their drug policy is based on two principles: Drug use is a public 
health issue rather than a criminal issue, and a distinction is made 
between so-called hard drugs like heroin and cocaine and soft drugs 
like marijuana and hashish.

The idea is that, if a problem has demonstrated that it's 
unstoppable, it's better to control the problem than to continue 
enforcing laws that have failed to stop it.

Dutch authorities, therefore, choose not to enforce all the laws. 
They generally turn a blind eye to possession of small amounts of 
marijuana and hashish for personal use, and they tolerate the coffee 
shops at which patrons can purchase small quantities of the so-called 
soft drug.

This, they say, removes the sale and distribution of marijuana and 
hashish from the criminal underworld in which harder and more harmful 
drugs are sold.

The policy apparently works well in the Netherlands. It has no more 
drug addicts than other European countries, and some studies indicate 
that even the rate of lifetime marijuana use is less than that of the 
United States.

So could the Dutch model work here?

It's difficult to say.

The Netherlands is a much smaller nation, for one thing. That makes a 
big difference.

And there are cultural differences. The Dutch are hardworking, polite 
and orderly. They have a long tradition of tolerance.

Americans are probably more uptight and definitely more violent. The 
homicide rate in America is about five times that of the Netherlands.

Just because a lenient drug policy works there, it doesn't mean it 
would work here.

But it's something interesting to consider.
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MAP posted-by: Beth Wehrman