Law Enforcement Against Prohibition

It's Time for an Exit Strategy from the "War on Drugs"

As more people become aware of the devastating consequences of the failed "war on drugs," it becomes apparent that we need to find a new way forward for actually controlling drugs. Many prominent citizens are now calling for the creation of a "Blue Ribbon Commission" to finally take a serious look at real solutions to our drug abuse and illegal drug market problems.

Indeed, Sen. Jim Webb (D-VA) and several other senators have introduced bipartisan legislation to create a commission charged with conducting an 18-month, top-to-bottom review of the nation's entire criminal justice system and offering concrete recommendations for reform. When asked on CNN about legalizing drugs, Sen. Webb replied, “Nothing should be off the table.”

Please join us by signing the petition below. We will compile the names and present them to Senator Webb in support of his bill, S.714, the National Criminal Justice Commission Act. We will also forward the petition and its signatures to President Obama.

Whereas, the overall situation regarding the use of drugs in our society and the crime and misery that accompany it has continued to deteriorate for several decades; and

Whereas, our society has continued to attempt, at enormous financial cost and loss of civil liberties, to resolve drug abuse problems through the criminal justice system, with the accompanying increase of prisons and numbers of inmates; and

Whereas, the huge untaxed revenues generated by the illicit drug trade are undermining legitimate governments world-wide; and

Whereas, the present system has spawned a cycle of hostility by the incarceration of disproportionate numbers of African-Americans, Hispanics, and other minority groups; and

Whereas, the number of people who have contracted AIDS, hepatitis, and other diseases from contaminated hypodermic needles is epidemic under our present system; and

Whereas, in our society's zeal to pursue our criminal approach, legitimate medical uses for the relief of pain and suffering of patients have been suppressed;

Therefore be it resolved that our society must recognize drug use and abuse as the medical and social problems that they are, and that they must be treated with medical and social solutions; and

Further be it resolved that an objective commission be immediately empowered by the President and by Congress to recommend revisions of the drug laws of these United States in order to reduce the harm our current policies are causing.

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Original signatories:

Dr. Milton Friedman	Nobel laureate; Professor Emeritus of Economics, University of Chicago; Senior Research Fellow, Hoover Institution, Stanford, CA
Dr. Joseph D. McNamara	Former Chief of Police, San Jose, CA, and Kansas City, MO; Fellow, Hoover Institution, Stanford, CA
Herbert Berger, M.D.	F.A.C.P.; F.C.C.P.; Internationally recognized authority on drug treatment, Staten Island, NY
Judge James P. Gray	Orange County Superior Court, Santa Ana, CA
Katherine H. Smith	Founder, Group Resolving Anti-Social Problems (GRASP), Anaheim, CA
S. Clarke Smith, M.D.	F.A.A.F.P.; Board of Directors, California Academy of Family Physicians, Anaheim, CA
Clifford A. Schaffer	Author; Computer Consultant, Canyon Country, CA
Frederick H. Meyers, M.D.	Professor of Pharmacology, University of California at San Francisco; Chairman of the California Research Advisory Panel on Drugs
Harvey L. Rose, M.D.	Author of California’s “Intractable Pain Treatment Act;” Family Practice, Carmichael, CA
John J. McCarthy, M.D., A.B.P.N.	Psychiatrist, Executive Director, Bi-Valley Medical Clinic, Sacramento, CA
Gary Davis, M.D.	Diplomate in Psychiatry, A.B.P.N., American Board of Psychiatry & Neurology, Citrus Heights, CA
Benson B. Roe, M.D.	Professor and Chief Emeritus of Cardiothoracic Surgery, University of California at San Francisco, CA
Stephen A. Fisher, M.D.	Diplomate in Psychiatry, A.B.P.N., American Board of Psychiatry & Neurology, Berkeley, CA
Reverend Leonard B. Jackson	First A.M.E. Church of Los Angeles, CA
Reverend J. D. Moore	First A.M.E. Church of Los Angeles, CA
Donald McNamara	Investment Consultant, New York, NY
Richard Arthur	Educator, Former Principal of Castlemont High School, Oakland, CA; Author of Gangs and Schools, Richmond, CA
Howard Levine	Office of the Mayor, Baltimore, MD
Kurt L. Schmoke	Mayor, City of Baltimore, Maryland
George P. Shultz	Former United States Secretary of State, Hoover Institution, Stanford, CA

Dedicated to our departed colleagues who courageously spoke out about the destructive policy of Drug Prohibition
Eleanor Schockett	Gil Puder	Whitman Knapp	John Perry	Ralph Salerno	Bob Owens	Eddie Ellison	Martin Haines