UNWINNABLE 'WAR'

Present Drug Policy Doomed To Failure

As the second day of the U.S.-Mexico Border Summit begins at the University
of Texas-Pan American, it's interesting to note what isn't on the
conference agenda. Missing from all the seminars on trade and business and
health and the environment is any frank talk about the drug policies of
either nation.

They might not want to talk about it, but attendees at the border summit
need to admit what more and more citizens of the United States and Mexico
have concluded: The "war" on drugs is a failure.

As much as they would like to, as much as they attempt to, politicians
cannot end self-destructive behavior just by passing laws. Whether it's
tobacco, alcohol or fatty foods, people will not stop consuming a substance
just because it is harmful, or just because it is illegal.

The United States sprays herbicides on Colombian jungles and production
continues. Police tell schoolchildren to "Just say no" and demand
continues. Governments pass laws, and the behavior continues. When faced
with evidence of their failure, lawmakers and police think the solution is
another law, one more program, some more money.

It's time to stop this futile effort to save people from themselves. We
need to find another way to reduce substance abuse, focusing on treatment
and decriminalization instead of interdiction and punishment. And the
United States can't tell other countries to do all the work.

We're sure conference attendees from Mexico would agree: It's unfair for
the United States to blame other countries for its drug problem when U.S.
citizens provide the biggest market. Demand for substances the American
government has declared illegal continues to increase. Despite what the
drug warriors claim, this demand can't be stopped, any more than the demand
for alcohol was stopped during American Prohibition from 1919 to 1933.

The market for illegal drugs is so huge and so lucrative, it ends up
financing gangs more powerful than some governments. In Matamoros this
year, armed men stormed a police station and rescued one of their own who
had been arrested by police. Later, the police commander and his assistant
were murdered. Drug money has corrupted officials on both sides of the Rio
Grande.

The present U.S. drug policy is unfair to its citizens. It has led to
increased police harassment of minorities and harsher sentences against
nonwhite defendants. It subjects people to searches at roadblocks, in
airports and elsewhere - searches that are so far beyond unreasonable they
are insane.

It has also produced forfeiture laws that defy the Fourth Amendment and
require owners to go to court to get their own property back from the
police. Many times, the proceeds from these seizures go to fund the police
agencies that took the goods or money in the first place. In the past, we
called it "highway robbery." Now the term is "law enforcement."

Officials must admit the "war" in its current form is not winnable. What do
we mean by the "war on drugs," anyway? The whole concept of declaring war
on an inanimate object is ridiculous. You can't defeat drugs' army. You
can't occupy drugs' capital city. You can't force drugs to surrender.

When the border summit ends, we hope attendees will take that concept with
them when they leave.