MAKE DRUG LAW REFORM COMPREHENSIVE

Reform is a term that can mean different things to different people,
particularly in politics.

Over the last few months, momentum has been building in favor of
changing two mandatory sentencing laws passed in 1973. The Rockefeller
Drug Laws require mandatory minimum sentences of 15 years to life for
possessing four ounces, or selling two ounces, of certain criminalized
recreational drugs. The Second Felony Offender Act mandates prison
time, usually 4 to 9 years, regardless of context or offense, for all
repeat felons.

Unfortunately, the parameters of the debate already appear to have
been narrowed down to a few particulars, such as how much sentence
reduction "flexibility'' is permissible, who will be granted greater
legal discretion in reduc@@hyphen@@ing sentences -- trial or appellate
judges -- and whether prosecutors will retain some form of "veto
power'' in certain cases. If this what is meant by reform, it is
doomed to failure.

The problem is not so much the harshness or inflexibility of the
existing sentencing structure, as it is the existence of the drug laws
themselves. What exactly has gone so wrong that, after over a quarter
century of acquiescence, there is now such bipartisan scrambling in
favor of modifying these laws?

The political system has begun to experience what in economics is
known as the law of diminishing return. The costs of incarceration --
costs here defined as tax revenues drawn from the middle class -- have
begun to exceed the perceived benefits, either tangible or symbolic,
of appearing "tough on drugs.''

Since 1988, for example, the state has reduced funding for city and
state universities by $615 million, to $1.48 billion, while increasing
funding for the state Department of Correctional Services by $761
million, to $1.76 billion. Trends such as this could not go on
indefinitely, at least not without alienating key constituencies and
undermining the legitimacy of government generally.

It should surprise no one that at just this moment reform has become a
"serious'' issue to be discussed by "serious'' individuals. The
numbers speak for themselves. The United States now imprisons close to
2 million people, a number comparable to nations like China; 1.1
million are in state prisons.

Since the early 1980s, New York's prison population has exploded.
Slightly more than a third of this increase has consisted of
individuals convicted of drug law violations: 23,344 as of the end of
1995. The two state laws now under scrutiny are respon@@hyphen@@sible
for more than 90 percent of all inmates imprisoned for drug offenses.
The 1995 cost of maintaining 8,586 individuals sentenced under the
Rockefeller Drug Laws was $258 million; the cost for the 13,013
sentenced under the Second Felony Offender Law was $390 million.
Despite massive prison construction and renovation costing additional
billions, overcrowding is endemic. Cost difficulties are being further
exacerbated as the mandatory minimum prisoner population ages. In this
regard, the much touted POPS Program for shifting the aging prison
population into incarceration "alternatives'' -- often eliminating the
need for providing the health care such individuals would require
should they remain inmates -- may be read as yet another minor
alteration of the status quo whose real motivation is largely devoid
of compassion and reducible to a dollar sign.

The reform proposals that have been the subject of public discussion
the last several weeks are emblematic of the way political elites
respond to a complicated issue: after tentatively feeling each other
out to ensure there is general agreement, they make the slightest
alteration possible to the status quo, hoping the problem goes away of
its own accord. It won't.

New York's politicians will in all likelihood pass some symbolically
attractive but meaningless legislation and then slip back into the
inertia that has been the norm. If they act at all, that is.

On the one hand, there are powerful lobbies whose narrow bureaucratic
interests are forwarded by wasteful and ineffective drug-war spending.
The State District Attorneys Association already has voiced
reservations about reform. On the other hand, like Nelson Rockefeller
30 years ago, Governor Pataki may have national ambitions and, again
like Rockefeller, he will need to court the right-wing fringes of his
party, something that may preclude appearing "soft'' on drug users.
His just unveiled proposals, which read like a wish-list for law
enforcement, are not so much "reform'' as reform stood on its head.
The issue at hand is not one of redressing a small number of
"sentencing disproportionalities'' as they have been characterized by
Court of Appeals Judge Joseph Bellacosa, Chief Judge Judith Kaye and
other jurists.

If the issue is justice, drug law reform must mean repealing the
majority of these laws in total, amnesty for all nonviolent
Rockefeller prisoners and sentence reductions for the rest. Sentencing
reform, to be truly comprehensive, must be coupled with genuine
alternatives to prison such as publicly funded treatment-on-demand for
the roughly one user in 10 who encounters difficulty with recreational
drug use. Our drug laws are divisive, intrusive, and cruel; their
human and monetary costs are enormous. It is imperative we relegate
them to where they belong, the past.

Michael A. Rimella

Michael A. Rinella, whose doctorate is in political science, has
written extensively on the history and ethics of drug use.