TOUGH CALL - COLLEGE & DRUG LAW

RHONDA SCHAFFLER, CNNfn ANCHOR, MARKET CALL: In the Academy
award-winning movie, "Traffic," Michael Douglas, who plays the
frustrated drug czar, says the fight against drugs is not just a war
on drugs-- it's also a war on our children. That's the framework in
which we will discuss today's tough call. Republican Congressman, Mark
Souder sponsored the passage of a bill in 1998 to attack the drug use
of college students. The law is being enforced for the first time by
the Bush administration this year. That law, in effect, makes any
college student convicted of possession or selling drugs ineligible
for financial aid for a maximum of two years. Repeat offenders could
lose their eligibility, permanently. Many opponents claim the law is
unfair, especially since no other criminal conviction carries the same
penalty. So, is this law a fair tool in fighting drug use?

Joining me now to make that tough call is Shawn Heller, president of a
student-run organization called Students For A Sensible Drug Policy;
and David Borden, Drug Reform (ph) Coordination Network. And we should
point out Congressman Mark Souder did decline our invitation to appear.

Let me start first with David-- welcome you both, David and
Shawn.

BOTH: Thank you.

But let me throw the question out to you, David. Is this policy any
- -- does any of it make sense to you as an effective tool against the
war on drugs?

DAVID BORDEN, DRUG POLICY COORDINATION NETWORK: Well, I think you made
a good analogy to the movie, "Traffic." In this whole drug war, our
policies are really designed to -- well, we're trying to help people
- -- we're trying to help people protect themselves from themselves by
ruining their lives, and it doesn't make a lot of sense. We've seen
the whole drug war failing over decades, and now we've come to this,
where we're attacking on educational system. It's not going to be any
more effective ultimately than the rest of the drug war.

SCHAFFLER: Let's have Shawn weigh in here with your opinion. I would
assume it's probably very similar-- that this does not make a lot of
sense to punish students for what, in some cases, a
misdemeanor.

SHAWN HELLER, STUDENTS FOR A SENSIBLE DRUG POLICY: Right. This law is
the lethal injection for students who want to attend college. I mean,
it only affects lower income students. If you commit rape, murder, or
any other violent crime, it doesn't apply to you. And Representative
Souder made our point very well in the recent "New York Times"
article, when he said that this law would not apply for his son, nor
would it keep him from using drugs because it only applies to students
who receive financial aid, which is at a lower income bracket.

BORDEN: May I add to that-if one were going to start to have other
crimes consistency demands, you would start with illegal underage
alcohol offenses, underage drinking, and then, you know, I don't think
very many people would be supporting such a law. And yet, alcohol is
the major drug problem on our campuses.

SCHAFFLER: It's an interesting point you made. Why do you think this
has become pretty much a political football, when we talk about drug
use? I mean, we know it is illegal, and most people of course, would
probably argue against drug use-- except in medicinal reasons. Why do
you think it became drug use and financial aid tied together when you
do have other issues, like underage drinking, which is illegal?

HELLER: Well, when do you stop paying your debt to society? I mean,
you've gotten sentenced by your judge. The judge had the discretion to
take away your federal financial aid in the first place, and now the
federal government is making blanket policy that is taking the
discretion away from judges, and inhibiting their ability to properly
sentence-- to sentence people with their own discretion.

And on top of that, we have 65 student governments across the country
that have called for the repeal of this legislation: the NAACP, the
ACLU and Students for a Sensible Drug Policy now is on over 100
campuses nationwide, and this law will be repealed. It only affects
lower income students, and it only applies to drug convicts, and
completely ignores every other type of crime, and we want the repeal
of this and then we can talk about campus drug use, we could talk
about campus drug abuse, and come up with some real ways to deal with
it, and not just let knee-jerk reaction legislation isn't going to
have any effect but to cost the educational opportunities of thousands
of students.

SCHAFFLER: I want to bring David back in here because the point being
that it impacts low income students-- these are the students who need
financial aid most. And as you alluded to earlier, perhaps turn their
lives around if they get a good college education. That's your issue,
correct?

BORDEN: That is one of the issues. There's another major issue that
our drug war is being waged in a racially discriminatory fashion. I'm
not making the accusation of deliberate racism, but when you have,
according to the federal government's own statistics, for example,
African-Americans making up 13 percent of the nation's drug users, but
55 percent of the drug convictions, we have a more than 4 to 1
disparity, and we're -- we believe that much of this disparity, if not
all, is bound to be translated over into this new law, affecting the
higher education system.

SCHAFFLER: David, if this new law is too harsh, what other way is
there to try to curb drug use? I mean, sometimes when you have a
harsh punishment, the message is there.

BORDEN: Well, there are already harsh-- very harsh punishments in
place for drug offenses under the criminal justice system. So, we
don't believe that educationally, or for criminal justice reasons,
there's a good reason to level this second punishment that only
affects the lower income. There are any number of positive approaches
to take towards drug abuse .

HELLER: Drug education, for example, as well as bringing in public
health officials to come in, and these are people who deal with drug
abuse situations on a daily basis and who should be dealing with drug
abuse on campus, rather than having Representative Souder from Indiana
who makes blanket legislation for people all across the country,
rather than public health people, who deal with this every day.

BORDEN: Right, and .

SCHAFFLER: Shawn, I'm sorry, let me just jump in and play devil's
advocate a little bit for Shawn. What do you say to the student who
works all the time to pay for college themselves, doesn't have time to
sit around and party? And how would you answer that argument, look,
you guys - I don't mean you - I mean these students using drugs,
sitting around, and somebody's paying for their way to go to college.
How do you answer that voice?

HELLER: Well, we see education as a solution to many of our nation's
problems, and ultimately we see that-we feel that if you take these
students who may be at risk, who may be using drugs or had a drug
abuse problem in the past and you put them in a college environment
and allow them to succeed, they're going to end up becoming productive
tax payers and people who are going to be contributing, and actually
costing less on society rather than a simple financial grant or loan
that was given to them-- because the majority of what we're talking
about here is federal loans that have to be paid back anyways. So,
take these students and take them out of the educational system, and
then where do they go?

BORDEN: And again, it comes back to the major drug issue on campuses
is alcohol. Recent news on that front included the president's
daughter in that as a college freshman, and so if we're going to be at
all consistent, that we need to include the drug, illegally used,
under 21, that is the major issue on the campuses.

SCHAFFLER: David, when do you think this law might be
appealed?

BORDEN: Well, we are hoping to appeal at this session of Congress,
when the Higher Education Act comes up for reauthorization, which it
does every four years: the spring, possibly the fall, and if things go
well, then that will happen.

SCHAFFLER: David Borden, Shawn Heller, unfortunately we're out of
time, but thanks for joining me on what is a tough call.

HELLER: Thank you.

SCHAFFLER: Appreciate that.

BORDEN: Thank you.