Social Costs of Prohibition

Pubdate: Mon, 26 Feb 2007
Source: Guardian, The (U of CA, San Diego, CA Edu)Copyright: 2007 UCSD Guardian.
Contact: editor@ucsdguardian.orgWebsite: http://www.ucsdguardian.org/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/2776Referenced: http://www.mapinc.org/drugnews/v07/n186/a02.htmlAuthor: Robert Sharpe

FEDERAL DRUG POLICY HARDLY INCONSEQUENTIAL
Dear Editor,
Regarding your Feb. 15 editorial ("Strife Over FAFSA Aid Provision Remains Symbolic"), the actual number of students stripped of financial aid due to drug offenses is 189,065. To obtain state-by-state numbers, Students for Sensible Drug Policy teamed up with the American Civil Liberties Union and sued the U.S. Department of Education, after their Freedom of Information Act request was denied. I encourage you to check out their Web site. The number of students impacted is hardly symbolic.
Instead of empowering at-risk students with a college degree, drug provisions in the Higher Education Act limit career opportunities and increase the likelihood that those affected will resort to crime.
Speaking of crime, convicted rapists and murderers are still eligible for federal student loans. Most students outgrow their youthful indiscretions involving illicit drugs. An arrest and criminal record, on the other hand, can be life-shattering.
After admitting to smoking pot (but not inhaling), former President Bill Clinton opened himself up to "soft on drugs" criticism -- thousands of Americans have paid the price in the form of shattered lives.
More Americans went to prison or jail during the Clinton administration than during any past administration. As an admitted former drinker and alleged illicit drug user, President George W. Bush is also politically vulnerable when it comes to drugs.
While youthful indiscretions didn't stop Clinton or Bush from assuming leadership positions, an arrest surely would have. The short-term effects of marijuana are inconsequential compared to the long-term effects of criminal records.
Students who want to help end the cultural war otherwise known as the war on some drugs should contact Students for Sensible Drug Policy at http://www.SchoolsNotPrisons.com.---Robert Sharpe, MPA

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While I was serving on my law school's admissions committee, we would regularly get applications from those who had been convicted of DUI, public intoxication, and some theft crimes. One even applied while in prison, serving time for a serious assault. Many of these we admitted, cautioning that they might have problems being allowed to take the bar exam. Many of them are now reasonably successful lawyers. All of them were eligible for fanancial aid while in school.

Only drug convictions, including simple possession charges deny federal student aid to college students. This short-sighted policy is only one form of the collateral damage caused by prohibition laws.

Have any of you, in your lifetime, heard of anyone blinded or killed by improperly distilled or blended liquor? It was common during alcohol prohibition, when anything with a kick could be sold without inspections, labels, or liability. Today, we have deaths from fentanyl- or rat poison-laced heroin; and almost half of the tested Ecstacy pills at one time were counterfeit, with sometimes disasterous results.

Do Merck or Pfiser contaminate their surroundings with waste from their factories? No, because we regulate and police them. But almost all bootleg meth labs (those that don't explode, maiming or killing those in the neighborhood, become hazardous waste dumps.

Did we correct that mess by licensing, policing, inspecting their plants? No, we instead made it extremely difficult -- it not impossible -- for the average citizen to buy simple, useful cold remedies and chased the meth plants and their problems to Mexico. The meth is still available to its users, but you can no longer buy Sudafed. (perhaps someone will smuggle it to us from Mexico).

It shouldn't have surprised us. The Andean countries have suffered for at least four decades from gasoline, kerosene, and strong acids dumped into their rivers.

Prohibition laws have several predictable results; unfortunately, those results do not include reduced availability or consumption.