DRUG LAWS ARE PROBLEM

The Charleston area has seen scores of heavily armed federal, local and
state police raiding local neighborhoods. An editorial several months ago
claimed that communities "will no longer submissively yield to the drug
menace." Officials proudly thump their chests as heavily armed assault
teams raid populated neighborhoods.

Government created the drug problem. Government ensured the illegal drug
trade would take root in our poorer neighborhoods. Now government sends
armed troops into our neighborhoods to liberate us from a problem of its
making. Our drug laws are the problem. Laws prohibiting the sale and
distribution of a product ensure that the criminal element will be the sole
source for the manufacture, distribution and sale of that product, whether
that product be the prohibited alcohol of 1919 to 1933 or the recreational
drugs of today. Jails would be less populated, more money would be
available for treatment programs, a more responsible citizenry would be
involved in the manufacture and distribution trade, and our poorer
neighborhoods would be less crime ridden if the current drug laws were
repealed as the 21st Amendment repealed the prohibition of alcohol in 1933.

Emmette Boone

Ladson