War on Drugs? part 2

Blacks are twice as likely to be living in poverty in comparison to the rest of the population (Poverty rate among African Americans nearly double that of White Americans). On the surface, a causal relationship between poverty and crime seems obvious and logical. If you can’t afford the things you want, you are more likely to rob someone than if you had plenty of money. Fifty-three percent of people in prison earned less than $10,000 in the year prior to their incarceration (Williams). However, we have had the opportunity and ability to track the overall crime rate during three different stages in our economy: the Great Depression, the roaring economy of the 1960’s, and the current recession that began in 2008 (Mac Donald). According to the theory that poverty causes crime, crime should have risen in the Great Depression, fallen during the 1960’s, and should be on the rise again today. However, facts show a different tale. Crime plummeted during the Great Depression. As Heather Mac Donald states, “The Great Depression also contradicted the idea that need breeds predation, since crime rates dropped during that prolonged crisis.” During the prosperous times of the 1960’s, crime was on the rise again; even though more cushy government jobs were being opened for inner city residents, homicide went up by forty-three percent. Today, as our economy shrinks again, crime has fallen to the lowest it has been since the early 1960’s. So, we can be fairly sure that while people in poverty may be more likely to commit crime, poverty itself does not cause crime. So, knowing that poverty itself does not directly cause crime, we can move past poverty as a root cause.

When it comes to drug arrests, thirty-three percent of those arrested were black (Crime in the US, 2009). This means that blacks were arrested at a rate nearly three times higher than their percentage of the population would suggest. However, the group Common Sense for Drug Policy (CSDP), has compiled data that shows that blacks comprise only eleven percent of the nation’s drug users while making up nearly sixty percent of those in state prisons for felony drug convictions. They also point out that prior to mandatory minimum sentencing, blacks received sentences only six percent longer than whites. Four years later, black prison terms were ninety-three percent longer than white prison terms. A big portion of that disparity comes from the disparity in enforcement of crack cocaine versus powder cocaine. Crack is largely used in the black ghettos whereas powder cocaine is generally the drug of choice of more affluent, usually white, users. Crack cocaine brings with it a punishment 100 times more harsh than powder cocaine. To add to it, while other drugs require the intent to distribute in order to get the harsh sentencing, one must merely possess crack to be hit with the harsher sentencing (The EFFECTIVE NATIONAL DRUG CONTROL STRATEGY 1999). Since crack has such harsh sentencing and is generally found in low income black communities, it is largely black people who get sent away for these long prison terms for possessing crack. According to the Institute on Race & Poverty, black people account for 37% of drug arrests, 55% of convictions, and a whopping 74% of those who are subsequently sent to prison (Institute on Race & Poverty).

The War on Drugs has focused law enforcement and law makers on the drug problem in America. There is indeed a problem, but the solution isn’t necessarily getting “tough on crime”. The laws regarding mandatory minimum sentencing and drug enforcement may have been written with good intentions, but they weren’t written with enough thought put into side effects or how they might collide with each other. As we know, felony convictions cause you to lose certain rights, chief among them your right to vote. Thanks to tougher enforcement of drug crime, more people are getting charged with felonies. These are people whose only crime may have been getting caught with some crack cocaine. With most drugs, you must be in possession of at least 500g to be charged as a dealer. Since the inception of the War on Drugs, only five grams of crack gets you charged with intent to distribute. Five grams of crack is just your average crackhead, yet now he’s a felon with no right to vote. He can get cleaned up, turn his life around, and become a productive member of society, but he still has lost certain, supposedly inalienable rights. With 33-37% of all drug arrests being black people, just correcting this disparity in enforcement will make a large impact. We also need to focus more on rehabilitation for drug offenders. This will have a widespread impact. Catch a man with drugs and toss him in lock up, he’ll go right back to them when he gets out. Rehabilitate the man and give him a chance to succeed and you have a much higher likelihood of keeping off drugs and out of prison.

No matter your opinion on crime, for 12% of the population to make up over 40% of the prison population has to tell you there is a serious problem. We’ve explored a few possible causes and looked at where those ideas go astray. Poverty may be related to increased crime rates, however poverty does not cause crime. We looked at the differing crime rates, arrest statistics, and conviction rates and saw that blacks still make up too great a proportion of arrestees and convicts. I’ve put forth my ideas for how to correct the system, but most importantly, I hope I’ve provided some new information and maybe shed some light on a problem that you may not have realized the depth of.