DRUG USE IS DANGEROUS AND IMMORAL

In his column "Medical Marijuana and the Folly of the Drug War"
[5/19/01, p. 1467], Stuart Taylor Jr. rejects Bill Bennett's claim that
"drug use is dangerous and immoral." Mr. Taylor takes Bennett's claim
"personally" because Taylor "smoked some marijuana" while in college. He
should not allow his past drug use to distort medical reality. Marijuana
use affects the part of the brain used in learning, memory, and
sensation. Long-term marijuana use produces changes in the brain similar
to those caused by harder drugs, and a marijuana joint contains three to
five times as much tar as a cigarette. Most of the young adults in
residential treatment at Phoenix House have used no drug more potent
than marijuana.

Mr. Taylor recoils from framing drug use as a moral issue. But we made
the most progress against drug use when it was framed in precisely those
terms. In the words of social scientist James Q. Wilson, "Drug use is
wrong because it is immoral, and it is immoral because it enslaves the
mind and destroys the soul."

By questioning the National Household Survey of Drug Abuse, Mr. Taylor
discounts that enormous progress was made in reducing drug use during
the 1980s. To "argue" against its reliability, he turns to Ethan
Nadelmann, a leading opponent of the war on drugs. According to
Nadelmann, "Surveys of drug use are inherently volatile and unreliable,"
with trends reflecting only whether an individual is ashamed to admit
using drugs.

The National Academy of Sciences disagrees: "Given the sensitive nature
of the questions posed, substantial resources are devoted to eliciting
accurate responses." In fact, when confronted with statistics such as
Bennett's in a 1998 interview on Nightline, Nadelmann conceded, "Drug
use has gone down."

Mr. Taylor also argues that the costs of the drug war far outweigh its
benefits. He cites the "500,000 drug offenders behind bars-many of them
first-timers, nailed for mere possession," and "black neighborhoods" and
"families [that] have been decimated by drug-related incarceration."

Taylor exaggerates the number of Americans imprisoned for first-time,
simple possession. Of all federal drug prisoners in 1997, only 5.3
percent were imprisoned for possession; on the state level, only 27.1
percent. Nor are the penalties too harsh. With marijuana, for example,
the trigger for the 10-year mandatory minimum is 1,000 kilograms-about 1
million joints. Nor are "mandatory minimums" mandatory: Legislation
expressly provides a "safety valve," used to allow people (such as those
"first-timers, nailed for mere possession") to avoid mandatory minimums.

We've rarely heard the cry for legalization from the residents of the
inner city. As John Jacob, former president of the National Urban
League, said: "Drugs kill more blacks than the Klan ever did. They're
destroying more children and more families than poverty ever did."

Kevin M. Cherry
Deputy Director of Policy, Empower America