SHAMEFUL LEGACY BEHIND DRUG LAW ENFORCEMENT

Dear Editor,

Is America a racist nation? The answer is not to be found in the speeches
of Trent Lott, but in our social institutions.

Most people who support the war on drugs scoff at the notion that it is a
racist institution, but history and current data show that it is indeed an
enduring legacy of Jim Crow. The forgotten history of how and why certain
drugs were outlawed reveals no valid scientific basis, but a strong
component of racial bigotry. Cannabis was sensationalized as a threat from
Mexicans and dubbed "marihuana". Cocaine was said to encourage black men to
look white women in the eye and much worse.

Although nobody today would make these arguments openly, they held sway in
the "good old days" when drug laws were first enacted.Today we see
extraordinary racial disparities in drug arrests, sentencing and incarceration.

The perception that certain racial minorities are more inclined to be
involved with illicit drugs is not borne out by any data but is rarely
refuted in the media. The "Weed and Seed" program is but one example of
how drug law enforcement is unfairly focused on minority communities. All
of this perpetuates the myth of degenerate races that was used to
criminalize certain drugs in the first place.

Unfortunately, this racist system of drug control is carried out largely
with the acquiescence of minority leaders who, like many of us, have been
led to confuse the harms of drug law enforcement with the harms of the
drugs themselves. Until we come to grips with this shameful legacy, we are
doomed to suffer racial divisions in our society.

Larry A. Stevens, Springfield