DRUG-LAW REFORM CAMPAIGN FLEXES ITS MUSCLES

George Soros, the Czech-American billionaire and international financier,
has spent about $30 million promoting drug-law reform the past six years.

Ethan Nadelmann, a rabbi's son, former Princeton professor and Soros' top
lieutenant, is an eloquent campaigner who insists the war on drugs is an
utter failure with dire social consequences.

Cheech and Chong they are not.

While bong-toting hippies, tie-dyed activists and dread-locked Rastas were
no match for the law-and-order establishment, Soros and Nadelmann and their
growing army of social and political scientists are proving a formidable
challenge to the status quo.

But while the battle over drug-law reform in America may be engaged, it is
far from over.

Congress is against them and so is the White House, no matter who occupies it.

They are also vilified -- with a few notable exceptions -- by governors and
state legislators, prosecutors and cops and most opinion-makers, including
newspaper editorial writers.

Faced with such staunch official resistance, the anti-war protesters have
taken their fight directly to the people in a shrewd campaign that seems to
grow stronger with each passing election.

The people are listening, even if the politicians are not.

Voters in many states seem to agree with the protesters that America's war
on drugs, first declared by Richard Nixon in 1972, is causing more harm
than drugs themselves.

The facts Nadelmann cites are sobering:

In 1980, when Ronald "Just Say No" Reagan won the presidency, the federal
drug-war budget was $1 billion and about 50,000 Americans were behind bars
for drug offenses.

Under Bill Clinton, Washington spent $18 billion this year on the drug war,
400,000 people are jailed for non-violent drug offenses and drugs are still
readily available.

Time for a change?

The Soros-backed, Nadelmann-led Lindesmith Center-Drug Policy Foundation
has steadfastly placed 19 measures on state ballots since the mid-'90s.

The proposals sought to legalize marijuana for medical use, divert drug
offenders from jail into treatment, and prevent police from seizing
property of suspected dealers.

The record so far has been remarkable: 17 victories, including five out of
six in the election just concluded.

The biggest prize this year was Proposition 36 in California.

It will trigger a sea change in social policy, shifting 20,000 or more drug
offenders from prison to treatment centers annually, saving taxpayers as
much as $200 million. The initiative passed with 61 percent of the vote.

Drug-law reformers also won with measures allowing the medical use of
marijuana in Nevada and Colorado and with laws restoring due-process
protection for property owners accused of drug crimes in Oregon and Utah.
The lone loss came in Massachusetts, where a proposal to divert certain
low-level drug dealers to treatment instead of jail failed.

"The public is turning against the drug war. Time and again voters have
been willing to endorse sensible alternatives to the status quo by large
margins," said Nadelmann, who lives in New York, where his organization has
offices, as well as offices in San Francisco.

"A vote on the drug war as a whole? That's premature. Our strategy is to
change the nation's drug policies from one driven by fear, ignorance,
prejudice and profit to one governed by common sense, science and concerns
for public health and human rights."

'Important Strides'

At the beginning of this election year, the anti-war movement held little
hope that the drug war would become part of the national debate.

Gary Johnson, New Mexico's lame-duck Republican governor, gained some
attention with speeches urging legalization and an end to the drug war. Tom
Campbell, the Republican candidate doomed in his bid to unseat Sen. Diane
Feinstein in California, made drug-law reform a main plank in his platform.

And in the closing weeks of the presidential campaign, Ralph Nader of the
Green Party decried the "corporate prison industry that wants ever more
customers, grossly discriminates against minorities and is greatly
distorted by the extremely expensive and failed war on drugs."

Few others, though, were challenging the drug war. Still, Nadelmann sees
progress.

"It's almost a relief that the two major presidential candidates didn't
talk about drugs because in the past all they've done is demagogue this
topic," he said.

Nadelmann also found the "shadow conventions" outside the GOP and
Democratic gatherings in Philadelphia and Los Angeles respectively as very
effective in rallying support for drug-law reform.

And he noted that African-American leaders like Jesse Jackson and
congressional members John Conyers of Detroit, Charles Rangel of Harlem and
Maxine Waters of Los Angeles "are speaking out against the consequences of
the drug war as never before."

"Obviously, we have a long way to go. But I think we made some important
strides this year," said Nadelmann.

Here To Stay

What's next for the drug-reform movement?

Bill Zimmerman of Santa Monica, Nadelmann's colleague who spearheaded
California's successful campaign for Prop. 36, said implementation of that
law plus efforts to sort out the ongoing medical-marijuana legal tangle
here and in other states are immediate priorities.

The Soros-backed reformers are quick to note, however, that they had
nothing to do with the failed effort in Alaska this year to legalize
marijuana. (They did, however, applaud a local ordinance that passed
overwhelmingly in California's Mendocino County that decriminalizes
personal use there.)

"We support initiatives that win and will continue to do so," said
Zimmerman. "It makes no sense to spend all this time, energy and money on a
ballot measure with no chance of winning."

Zimmerman and Nadelmann resist the "legalizer" label opponents have tried
to pin on them.

Rather, their message is that drugs are here to stay in our society and the
criminal-justice approach to the drug problem is doomed.

Reducing addiction and abuse through treatment and education is the only
sensible solution, they contend. The country may be ready for that, may
even be ready for decriminalization -- but not outright legalization.

"At this point, legalization of recreational drug use would not be approved
by voters in any state," said Zimmerman, "so we're not going to waste time
with it.

"My hope is that (Soros), who does not qualify as a legalizer, would still
be willing to financially support initiatives to end marijuana prohibition
in certain states when we feel the public there is ready for it."

The record suggests that if that moment comes, Nadelmann and Zimmerman and
their growing movement of drug-law reformers will seize it.