ONLY UNDER LEGALIZATION CAN WE CONTROL DRUG USE

Having spent 33 years as a police officer making my share of drug
busts and sending countless "messages" to dealers and users alike, I
agree with Philadelphia District Attorney Seth Williams that "going
after the kid who's smoking a joint" will not solve our drug
problems. Williams recently decided to downgrade minor
marijuana-possession penalties from jail time to community service.

Sadly, though, "going after" the larger sellers and producers will
not solve our drug problem, either. At least not until we get smart
about how we go after them.

When my squad arrested a rapist or bank robber, we changed the world.
We took the threat off the streets. When we arrested a drug dealer,
at any level, we only created a job opening - quickly filled by
people more desperate, ruthless, and well-armed than those they replaced.

Since President Richard Nixon declared his "War on Drugs" four
decades ago, we have made about 40 million drug arrests. Yet today
drugs are more potent, affordable, and far more widely used by
Americans, especially our children, who report on federal surveys
that it is easier for them to get illegal drugs than alcohol.

Philadelphia defendants avoid prosecution in nearly two-thirds of
violent-crime cases, but it's not because of poor policing; it's
because of poor priorities - the drug laws - which deflect our
attention and resources away from those crimes.

In the 1960s, we solved nearly 90 percent of all homicides
nationally. But federal drug policies have shifted our focus from
such crimes to mostly consensual nonviolent activities, where cops
don't belong in a free society. As a result, some people are
literally getting away with murder. Nationally today, we solve only
six out of 10 homicides.

The War on Drugs targets the poorly educated, low-income, and people
of color, and deprives them of opportunities for advancement, thus
throwing them back into the only place they are welcome, the drug
culture. It's a self-perpetuating, dysfunctional dance that yields
street crime, needle-spread diseases such as AIDS and hepatitis, and
encourages kids to drop out of school to chase the remote possibility
of the big score in "the dope game."

The problem will not be solved at the margins. The problem is
prohibition itself, a policy that should be replaced with strict,
legalized regulation.

Modest marijuana reforms like Williams' new policy in Philadelphia,
though, do underscore the insanity and irrationality of our overall
approach. If it makes no sense to charge, convict, and sentence
someone for using marijuana, why is it a police priority to arrest
the person who sells it to him? If it is a consensual sale between
adults, why is the state, in the form of the police, involved in the
first place?

Education, social pressure, and smart regulation work. Prohibition
doesn't. Never has, never will. Remember the "noble experiment" of
banning alcohol?

More and more cops are saying we need to legalize drugs - not because
we think they are safe, but because only through legalization can we
regulate, control, and keep them out of the hands of our children.
Our greatest drug-related public health victory - virtually our only
such victory - has been the dramatic reduction in cigarette smoking.
And that was achieved through education and regulation. We didn't
have to send a single person to jail.

Our grandparents had the wisdom to end alcohol prohibition, not
because they decided booze was a harmless drug - far from it. They
realized that police and judicial corruption, street violence, and
unnecessary deaths from an unregulated drug were the inevitable
result of a prohibition on consensual "crime." They realized that
legalized regulation would sharply reduce the street violence and
corruption that had reached historic highs, while cutting the cartels
of their day - think Al Capone - off at the knees.

They were right.

The only thing today's cartels really fear is a legalized, tightly
regulated market. The only smart way to cut them off at the knees is
to abandon the futile paramilitary approach that keeps them and their
street thugs armed and dangerous.

Of course the court system will be improved as Philadelphia removes
some marijuana cases under Williams' new approach. But this is just a
fraction of the drug-war caseload that comprises at least 30 percent
of Philadelphia's total arrests every year.

And this well-intentioned reform won't fundamentally alter policing
procedures; without meaningful change in drug policy, the arrests
will continue. As Philadelphia police spokesman Frank Vanone put it:
"Until they legalize it, we're not going to stop" arresting people
for marijuana.

Cops don't have to be pawns in this endless tail-chasing game. We
deserve better.

All citizens deserve better.

It's time.