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Cannabis Campaigners' Guide News Database result:
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US strongarm tactics have failed
Stephen McGinty The Scotsman
Thursday 19 Jul 2001 THE dark legacy of Richard Nixon was more than just Watergate, Vietnam and profane language in the White House. He fired the first shots in what would become America's war on drugs. The strong-arm campaign clogged the penal system and left supply and demand unscratched. More than 25 years after Nixon left Washington in disgrace, immortalised in All The President's Men, it has taken a second Hollywood movie to unveil the failure of his drugs policy, picked up again and again by successors. Traffic, starring Michael Douglas, exposed the private dilemmas behind the public war and earned praise from politicians and editorial writers of the New York Times. The extent of America's drugs problem is considerable. The country has the highest rates of cannabis and ecstasy use among the 16-19 age group in the world, while 80 million US citizens have taken illegal drugs despite the threat of some of the world's stiffest sentences. Under the 1973 Rockefeller laws, the minimum sentence for selling two ounces or possessing four ounces of heroin or cocaine is 15 years to life. US prisons have 500,000 users and dealers behind bars, more than the prison population of western Europe. Under Clinton, 4,175,357 cannabis users were arrested, yet he admitted the imprisonment policy should be reviewed. After 30 years of tough action, the public are demanding users be treated differently - like in California where a new state law asks judges to favour treatment over incarceration.
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