War on Drugs and the Black Community – PLSC 359: Global Governance

Last semester I took Justice 205, Justice and Civil Societies and it changed my thinking of America’s definition of justice. One of the books that we read was called, The New Jim Crow by Michelle Alexander.

In it, Alexander describes the effect that Nixon’s 1970’s “war on drugs” had on inner city populations, specifically black people (and hippies). The main idea is that the people who consume the most drugs are white people. She includes data to support that point. So why aren’t more white people behind bars for drug use/distribution? It’s solely because they are using drugs in the comfort of their own homes, while black people are being arrested in mass numbers for using drugs on the streets…where many black people have been forced to live.

Another interesting part of the law is the 1:100 sentencing ratio, when it comes to drug distribution. In the 80s, black people were mostly using crack and white people were mostly using cocaine. The sentencing rule said that for every 50 grams of crack, someone who get 10 years in federal prison. However, for every 5,000 grams of cocaine, one would also get 10 years in prison. Source: http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/15/opinion/15thu3.html?_r=0

That leads to my main point in this post: the article where one of Nixon’s former aides said that the war on drugs, was in fact, a war against black people.

“The Nixon campaign in 1968, and the Nixon White House after that, had two enemies: the antiwar left and black people,” former Nixon domestic policy chief John Ehrlichman said. “You understand what I’m saying? We knew we couldn’t make it illegal to be either against the war or black, but by getting the public to associate the hippies with marijuana and blacks with heroin. And then criminalizing both heavily, we could disrupt those communities,” Ehrlichman said. “We could arrest their leaders. raid their homes, break up their meetings, and vilify them night after night on the evening news. Did we know we were lying about the drugs? Of course we did.”

Source: http://www.cnn.com/2016/03/23/politics/john-ehrlichman-richard-nixon-drug-war-blacks-hippie/index.html

-I must add that his children deny that he said this quote but Trump, presidential candidate, is also denying that his father is a member of the KKK. People lie.

Now, think about justice. privilege. equality. equity. and the society we live in.

Rohan Dalal says:

April 4, 2016 at 12:30 am

I took Justice and Civil Society as well and read Michelle Alexander’s work. While I thought it was rather interesting, I felt that she made a lot of assumptions that left me quite unconvinced. Coming from a third world country like India, the magnitude of poverty and how it affects people, in my opinion is far worse than the situation in America. Furthermore, while Michelle Alexander focused on how black lives were targeted, she also makes some good points regarding the political implications behind not just race but also poverty. Comparatively, third world countries are faced with even graver consequences of corruption. The point I am trying to highlight is that Alexander makes many claims that connect mass incarceration , drug dealing and consumption to poverty and racism. I however contend that while these political and racial causes may be contributing to drug dealing and mass incarceration, they do not cause the same result in more corrupt and dysfunctional states. While this may be an extremely controversial topic, I think that it needs to be stated that such links are not seen in even worse environments, hence they may not be such strong contributing factors. It could be argued that most third world countries do not have the element of racism that exists in America, yet these countries are riddled with even worse problems that remain unreported as they do not hold as much significance on global governance.

antone says:

April 13, 2016 at 4:28 pm

Ivana, I think that the Erlichman quote really shows the concerted efforts our governments have historically made to disenfranchise black people. Richard Nixon relied heavily on his “southern strategy” to win elections. He used racial hostilities to scare and bring together the white vote, allowing him to sweep the south as a Republican. The south had historically voted Democrat before.
I’ve seen the discrepancies in drug sentencing with people I know on campus. I know people who were sent to prison for weed and others who got only community service for cocaine. It really is tragic to think about how these systemic inequalities still exist, even though we have a president who admits to having used these drugs in his past.
I really hope for a rationalization of our drug laws, along with legalization for drugs like Cocaine and Marijuana, which currently fund drug cartels across two continents.

Ethan Phillips says:

May 1, 2016 at 12:34 am

The war on drugs brought about the strict drug laws. These included three-strike laws, which if someone was convicted three times they would get a minimum sentence of 15 years. Along the three strike laws, harsh drug laws were introduced, as you said “Another interesting part of the law is the 1:100 sentencing ratio, when it comes to drug distribution. In the 80s, black people were mostly using crack and white people were mostly using cocaine. The sentencing rule said that for every 50 grams of crack, someone who get 10 years in federal prison. However, for every 5,000 grams of cocaine, one would also get 10 years in prison.” I think this shows how the United States places such a high emphasis on retribution rather than rehabilitation. The US has significantly the highest amount of people incarcerated. I think we should look to countries like the Netherlands, or Germany, who really focus on the idea of rehabilitation for drug users. How can we improve society if we just lock up people that have substance abuse problems. Shouldn’t we use our resources, instead of locking them up, to treat them in order to prevent these problems in the future?