The Baltimore Sun
March 15, 2003
Former Mayor Kurt L. Schmoke should know better than to advocate state
involvement in treatment of addiction ("Time for new tactics in costly drug
war," Opinion Commentary, Feb. 25).
Addiction treatment providers strive to change the way people think about
themselves. But the state has no business inside its citizens' heads. When
the state gets involved in treating people for addiction, it entangles
itself with religion. And when courts order someone into treatment for
addiction they violate the First Amendment.
This is because treatment for addiction meets the legal criteria of a
religious activity: The programs involve tenets to guide one's daily life
and use rituals similar to religious rituals. Belief in a supreme being or
"higher power" is not necessary for an activity to be religious.
Mr. Schmoke's unconstitutional proposal is a problem masquerading as a cure.
The only solution to the drug "problem" is to repeal prohibition in its
entirety.
Jeffrey A. Schaler
The writer teaches psychology at Johns Hopkins University and drug policy at
American University.
Time for new tactics in costly drug war
MARYLAND HAS a chance to revisit its drug policies in ways that it hasn't
for several decades because of the pledge by Gov. Robert L. Ehrlich Jr. to
"work together to get nonviolent drug offenders out of jail and into
treatment programs, where they belong."
Within days of Mr. Ehrlich's vow in his State of the State address,
Democratic Dels. Salima Siler Marriott and Curtis S. Anderson, both of
Baltimore City, and Pauline H. Menes of Prince George's County introduced
legislation to divert nonviolent offenders into treatment, abolish mandatory
sentences and return discretion to judges, and grant drug offenders the same
"good time" credits that are given to nonviolent offenders.
A recent report by the Justice Policy Institute - along with decades of
experience with using prisons as the primary tactic for combating drug use -
argues forcefully for moving in the direction that Mr. Ehrlich has proposed
and the legislation prescribes.
When I first called for a re-examination of the war on drugs in 1988,
Maryland's prisons had 13,572 inmates and a $475 million budget. Today,
Maryland prisons hold 23,752 inmates with a budget approaching $1 billion,
giving prisons the fastest-growing budget in the state.
A survey by Mother Jones magazine said that Maryland's per capita spending
on corrections grew during the 1980s and 1990s at four times the rate of per
capita spending on higher education. With Maryland facing a $1.8 billion
shortfall and 30 state departments facing cuts, corrections is slated to
receive an increase, along with $92 million in construction funds - the
biggest prison construction increase in a decade.
Drug abuse is the single largest category for which Marylanders are
incarcerated. More than one-third of annual entrants to Maryland's prisons
are drug offenders.
More than one-half of Baltimore's young African-American men were under some
form of criminal justice control in the early 1990s. Four of every five
Maryland inmates are African-American, and Latinos are the fastest growing
population in Maryland's prisons.
With this enormous level of expenditures and government control, one would
expect that the war on drugs would be won by now. Yet drugs are just as easy
to come by on Baltimore's streets, and Baltimore's arrest rate for cocaine
and heroin is 10 times the national average.
While the report reveals some disturbing data, it also points to some
hopeful trends that mark an opening for policy-makers to rethink the war on
drugs.
Six states - all with Republican governors - closed prisons last year. In
Louisiana, the state with the nation's highest incarceration rate, state
Sen. Charles Jones authored legislation abolishing mandatory sentences and
returning discretion to judges, a bill signed by Republican Gov. Mike
Foster. Similarly, Michigan, Connecticut, Alabama, Mississippi and North
Dakota all repealed mandatory sentences. These policy shifts often had a
strong bipartisan flavor to them.
Since 1999, voters in California and Arizona overwhelmingly passed ballot
initiatives diverting nonviolent offenders from prison into treatment. Fully
30,000 inmates have been diverted into treatment in California since 2000,
and the number of licensed drug treatment slots has increased by 68 percent.
The California Legislative Analyst's Office estimates that this initiative
will save $1.5 billion during its first five years.
Surveys show increasing dissatisfaction with the war on drugs and a yearning
for a more sensible approach.
According to a 2001 Pew Research Center poll, three-quarters of Americans
believe the war on drugs is a failure. In a Hart and Associates survey last
year, 75 percent of Americans approved of sentencing nonviolent offenders to
probation instead of prison, and a majority supported eliminating mandatory
sentencing and returning discretion to judges.
These findings cut across party lines - more than two-thirds of Republicans
favored treatment and probation for nonviolent offenses, and a majority
favored "tougher approaches to the causes of crime" over the policies of the
past. A 1998 survey by the University of Maryland, College Park found that
60 percent of Marylanders supported giving judges discretion to sentence
nonviolent offenders instead of mandating imprisonment.
The institute's report recommends diverting carefully selected nonviolent
criminals and drug offenders into treatment instead of incarceration. Some
of the money saved by this would be spent on treatment for would-be
prisoners and some used to stave off cuts to education and social services.
The proposed legislation goes a long way toward making the governor's words
and the institute's recommendations a reality. Perhaps with Republicans and
Democrats uniting on this issue, there's a chance to forge a bipartisan
middle ground on Maryland's approach to the thorny problems of substance
abuse.
Kurt L. Schmoke, dean of the Howard University School of Law, is former
mayor and state's attorney for Baltimore City.
Silver Spring
By Kurt L. Schmoke
The Baltimore Sun
February 24, 2003
