LBANY, Jan 20 — Three recent events hint at a change
in public attitudes toward the war on drugs. On Wednesday, Gov.
George E. Pataki proposed softening the harsh Rockefeller-era
drug laws in New York State. Gov. Christie Whitman of New Jersey
acknowledged that her state police had been stopping black and
Hispanic drivers as part of a drug-enforcement effort the public
once applauded and moved to stop the practice. And within the
last two weeks President Clinton has not only urged a
re-examination of federal drug sentencing, but also proposed
equalizing penalties for possession of powdered and crack
cocaine, on the ground that the stiffer penalties for crack
discriminated against members of ethnic minorities.
If politicians are societal weather vanes, then the war on
drugs seems to be losing some appeal. For decades, experts on
drug addiction have argued that long prison terms for nonviolent
drug offenders, many of whom are addicts as well, are less
effective than drug-treatment programs at reducing crime. They
also say imprisonment is more expensive than treatment. The
country's prison population has grown to two million, and a
quarter of the inmates are serving time for drug offenses.
Until recently, though, these arguments have failed to move
many Americans or their public officials. But now the cause is
being joined by Republican governors and an outgoing president
who greatly expanded federal financing for drug interdiction and
local law enforcement, and gave $1 billion to help the Colombian
military attack cocaine trafficking.
Why are critics of the drug war making headway now? The
answer, criminologists and other experts say, may lie in the
waning of the public's fear of crime.
Fear begets intolerance. People and the politicians they
elect are more willing to put up with severe penalties for
relatively minor drug offenses when crime rates are high, as it
was in New York City in the late 1960's and early 1970's, the
period that produced the Rockefeller laws.
At the time, heavy heroin use in the city was widely blamed
for rapidly increasing property crime. The city experienced
another, more murderous, crime wave in the late 80's and early
90's when crack cocaine became popular. City officials responded
with a huge expansion of the police force and an aggressive
campaign against street dealers and people carrying concealed
guns.
Now, though, crime has declined steadily for several years,
and violent crime in New York City has reached its lowest levels
since 1967. Fear has eased, and the public has begun to question
some harsher elements of the war on drugs and crime. "There is a
pretty clear correlation between the crime rate and criticism of
law-enforcement officials for being too tough," said the
director of the Jerry Lee Criminology Center at the University
of Pennsylvania, Lawrence Sherman. "As crime rates drop, you see
more people complaining about the cops."
At the same time, legions of people whose children are
serving lengthy sentences under the Rockefeller laws have begun
making their presence felt in Albany. Many are black and Latino,
and many maintain that the laws, as enforced, discriminate
against their ethnic groups. More than 21,000 people are serving
time for drug convictions in New York State, about 95 percent of
whom are black or Hispanic. About 70 percent were convicted of
nonviolent crimes.
"Where is the sanity?" asks Mary Mortimer of New York City,
who has two sons serving prison time, one 15 to 30 years, the
other 10 to 20, both for possession of small amounts of cocaine
with intent to sell. "I'd like to be able to spend some time
with my sons on this earth before I leave here."
These days Mr. Pataki can afford the political consequences
of listening to Mary Mortimer and people like her. After six
years in office, his reputation as a tough-on-crime governor is
well established. He pushed for and signed the death penalty
back into law, he increased sentences for many crimes, and he
eliminated parole for violent crimes. The governor may also be
reacting to the political winds from other parts of the country
as well. In November, California voters passed a proposition
requiring the state to direct most people convicted of
nonviolent drug possession into treatment programs rather than
prison. Arizona passed a similar law, and the governor of New
Mexico has said he plans to introduce comparable changes this
year. Even some New York legislators who voted for the
Rockefeller laws in 1973 now advocate their repeal. John R.
Dunne, a former state senator from Long Island, has formed a
coalition to lobby the governor with other former state
lawmakers, including Warren Anderson, who was Senate majority
leader from Binghamton.
In the early 70's, besides the heroin epidemic, Gov. Nelson
A. Rockefeller was faced with a youthful counter-culture,
particularly in New York City, that often celebrated "sex, drugs
and rock and roll," as a line from a popular song put it.
Governor Rockefeller, a liberal Republican, first tried to
persuade the Legislature to create the Narcotics Addiction
Control Commission and establish secure residential treatment
centers around the state. He also started methadone clinics for
addicts. Those efforts proved costly and failed to reduce crime.
So in 1973, a frustrated Mr. Rockefeller proposed the "lock them
up and throw away the key" approach. Some historians have said
that Mr. Rockefeller had his eye on the presidency and hoped to
appear more conservative. In any case, he persuaded the
Legislature, over the objections of some New York City
lawmakers, to pass the laws that carry his name.
At the time, the state had 12,000 state prison inmates. Today
it has 70,000. Oddly enough, the laws put the state out of step
with the times. In 1970, Congress had liberalized the harsh drug
laws passed in the mid-1950's, eliminating many mandatory
sentences for drug offenses and repealing the death penalty for
heroin dealers who sold to minors. In 1977, President Carter
formally advocated legalizing marijuana in amounts up to an
ounce.
It was not until 1986, after the effects of the cocaine craze
of the early 1980's had begun to materialize, that Congress
passed tough drug laws with mandatory sentences and the death
penalty for what were called drug kingpins. Crack addiction and
drive-by shootings dominated the headlines. The war on drugs was
back with a vengeance, and the Rockefeller laws once again
meshed with the tenor of the times.
Judging by Mr. Pataki's latest proposal, however, the
pendulum has begun to swing back the other way, in no small
part, criminologists say, because violent crime is down 40
percent in New York since he took office. "The general public's
attitude is more tolerant because the crime problem has been
reduced so much," said Dr. David F. Musto of Yale University, an
authority on the history of narcotics in America.
In calling for these changes, which go much farther than
changes he proposed in 1999, Governor Pataki is not abandoning
his political roots. What he has proposed falls far short of
repeal of the Rockefeller laws, a step that some critics have
urged. They want judges to have discretion in sentencing for all
narcotics cases. They also complain that Mr. Pataki has not
called for changing what they see as the laws' biggest problem,
the fact that their mandatory sentences are based on the weight
of the drugs seized rather than on the role of the person
arrested. So a low-level "mule," addicted himself, who is hired
to cart some cocaine across town, can end up serving 15 years.
Mr. Pataki has proposed reducing the mandatory sentence for
the top class of drug offender to 10 years, from 15. The current
laws impose a 15-year-to-life sentence for possession of more
than four ounces of cocaine or heroin or for sale of two ounces
or more. Judges would have discretion to send people to
treatment only in the case of low-and mid-level drug
offenses.
One danger is that district attorneys, most of whom oppose
weakening the law, will stop charging people with the lesser
offenses. "The key to sentencing reform is giving judges
discretion," said Anita Marton of the Legal Action Center, a
nonprofit advocacy organization that specializes in drug issues
and has offices in New York and Washington. "This tries to chip
away at that but it doesn't get to the heart of the issue. This
proposal is not going to affect the vast majority of
offenders."
If the debate in Albany or the vote in California is any
indication, the war on drugs is not likely to be abandoned
altogether. No one on either side of the debate over the
Rockefeller drug laws is arguing that violent drug dealers
should be given lesser sentences or that drugs should be
legalized.
But if Governor Pataki and the Legislature reach an agreement
on changing the Rockefeller laws, the resulting legislation is
likely to resemble the California model.
The governor's aim is to retain harsh penalties for violent
felons but move nonviolent addicts back into society. The hope
is that the prison population will then drop but that high crime
rates will not return.
"The governor thinks it's good policy, that this is something
it is time to do," said a spokeswoman for Mr. Pataki, Caroline
Quartararo. "The crime rates are way down because we are locking
up violent offenders for a long period of
time."
