By Joe Klare
“The Nixon campaign in 1968, and the Nixon White House after that, had two enemies: the antiwar left and black people, you understand what I’m saying? We knew we couldn’t make it illegal to be either against the war or black, but by getting the public to associate the hippies with marijuana and blacks with heroin. And then criminalizing both heavily, we could disrupt those communities. We could arrest their leaders. raid their homes, break up their meetings, and vilify them night after night on the evening news. Did we know we were lying about the drugs? Of course we did.”
– John Ehrlichman, Domestic Policy Chief for President Nixon
Like it or not, the United States has a long history of oppressing black people. Slavery, segregation and the continued destruction of the black community through the War on Drugs is a big part of our history. We can ignore it, or we can learn from it. Part of learning from mistakes of the past is learning not to continue those mistakes under a different name.
After the Civil War and the freeing of the slaves, racist white people needed a new way to separate black culture from white culture. Out of this need, Jim Crow Laws — laws designed to segregate blacks from whites in society and make sure black people had a much tougher time advancing in society overall — were born.
The 1950s and 1960s brought massive change to the U.S. and most vestiges of Jim Crow were wiped away from the law books. But in so many ways, the War on Drugs — a war whose origins are discussed in the quote above — has replaced Jim Crow as the latest systematic way in which black people are held down in American society.
Anyone who knows me knows I’m one of the last people to yell “racism” when an issue is discussed, but in the case of the War on Drugs being a continuation of Jim Crow, the evidence is hard to ignore. Here are just the top ten ways in which the War on Drugs is a continuation of Jim Crow Laws.
1. Black men are arrested for drug crimes at a rate that far exceeds whites, even though both races show similar drug usage rates
According to a report by Human Rights Watch, during the period from 1980 to 2007 “adult African Americans were arrested on drug charges at rates that were 2.8 to 5.5 times as high as those of white adults.” In some cities and counties in the U.S., that rate can exceed 10 to 1.
2. Black men go to prison at a higher rate than whites for the same drug crimes
About half of all men in prison are there for drugs crimes. About 70% of all men in prison are black or Hispanic. According to one government study, “On December 31, 2014, black males had higher imprisonment rates than prisoners of other races or Hispanic origin within every age group. Imprisonment rates for black males were 3.8 to 10.5 times greater at each age group than white males and 1.4 to 3.1 times greater than rates for Hispanic males.”
3. Black men receive longer sentences for drug crimes than whites
According to the NAACP: “5 times as many Whites are using drugs as African Americans, yet African Americans are sent to prison for drug offenses at 10 times the rate of Whites,” and “African Americans represent 12% of the total population of drug users, but 38% of those arrested for drug offenses, and 59% of those in state prison for a drug offense.”
But that’s not all: “African Americans serve virtually as much time in prison for a drug offense (58.7 months) as whites do for a violent offense (61.7 months).”
4. Criminal records follow black men the rest of their lives
Of course, criminal records follow people of all races the rest of their lives in many cases, but as demonstrated above, black men are much more affected by this than any other group. A record can have many adverse effect on someone’s future; we’ll delve into some of the ways below.
5. A record can keep someone from getting a job
And since black men have criminal records at disproportionate rates compared to other races, their chance at gaining meaningful employment is greatly reduced. No job equals no money, which often means many young black men find their way back to the path of crime.
6. Black families are left without fathers
While white children live in single parent families about 25% of the time, that rate is 67% for black children. This disparity can be traced directly back to black incarceration rates, which have been thrown out of proportion by the War on Drugs.
7. A stigma surrounds the black community that they use/sell more drugs than whites
When broken down by race, a higher percentage of white people sell drugs than black people, yet the perception of many is that a black person is more likely to be a dealer because black people are arrested for dealing more often than whites. This leads to a stigma that can hamper education and employment opportunities for black people, especially young black men.
8. Higher incarceration rates harm the health and educational opportunities of black people
Educational opportunities are affected by a criminal record in much the same way employment opportunities are; in fact, the two often go hand-in-hand. Time in prison and less income can also lead to reduced physical and mental health, which leads to a lower quality of life in many cases.
9. Like Jim Crow, the War on Drugs has sparked a massive backlash
The 1950s and 1960s saw a massive increase in activism in the United States, much of it centered around the destruction of Jim Crow Laws and the way they harmed the black community. A similar revolution is currently underway in regards to drug prohibition as laws are relaxed for cannabis in many states and mandatory minimum sentencing laws are struck down or abolished across the country.
10. Like Jim Crow, the War on Drugs will come to an end
The road is long and the battles are numerous; many will sacrifice along the way. But there will come a day in this country when the War on Drugs will cease to be, just like Jim Crow ceased to be. Hopefully this time, it won’t be replaced by an oppression of another name.
For more detailed information on the ways in which the War on Drugs is the new Jim Crow, I highly suggest the book “The New Jim Crow” by civil rights attorney Michelle Alexander.