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.

First Name*

Last Name

Email*

Zip/Postal Code*

Additional comments about the "war on drugs":

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

0-25 of 2391 signatures

Number	Date	Name	Additional comments about the "war on drugs":
2391	November 20, 2009	Joseph Beedle
2390	November 20, 2009	Nicolas Quartermaine-Bragg	Where can we stand to use certain mind altering substance for the benefit of progress? Why are we beig inhibited from this
2389	November 20, 2009	Mark Thompson	i have smoked cannabis since roughly ninth grade I am now 43 years old
2388	November 20, 2009	WILLIAM ATHERTON	This asinine prohibition on drugs will only result in more death and crime throughout our country. It is a failed experiment, by any criteria that you might want to use. The drug prohibition LAWS are causing the crime. Just as with alocohol, if you take away the profit motive (black market), you take away the crime. It should be taxed and controlled just exactly like alcohol. ANY person who is likely to use ANY illegal drugs will use the drugs, whether they have to buy them from a criminal on the street or from a pharmacist or opther legal venue. Please stop this endless blood and madness on our streets. Take a cue from Amsterdam.
2387	November 20, 2009	Scott E
2386	November 20, 2009	Linden Hansmann
2385	November 19, 2009	Justin Albney
2384	November 19, 2009	Dominic	the war on drugs is a joke. its just so the people who are fighting the drugs can make money and so that people who run probation and the jail system can get their money also. the war on drugs is a failure and everyone knows it, so just end the war already.
2383	November 19, 2009	Mark Goldstein
2382	November 19, 2009	Orville Edwards	The war on drugs is a tremendous failure, and a waste of millions, and even billions of dollars, that our declining economy could be used else where.
2381	November 19, 2009	Roberto Ripp
2380	November 18, 2009	Doug Pickrel
2379	November 18, 2009	cleve burd
2378	November 18, 2009	Karsen FINNEY
2377	November 18, 2009	Karsen FINNEY
2376	November 18, 2009	Karsen FINNEY
2375	November 18, 2009	Michael Stallings	The real crime, has been the cruel social injustice brought on the simple user (particularly marijuana smokers) and the ill spent billions of taxes that could have gone to treatment and other needs.
2374	November 17, 2009	FELIPE FARIA
2373	November 17, 2009	charlie schneider	thanks for caring about the public
2372	November 17, 2009	George Jenkins
2371	November 16, 2009	Zachary Sage
2370	November 16, 2009	Paul Dunn
2369	November 16, 2009	Patrick Williams	The "war" is futile, Marijuana doesn't cause cancer, and it doesn't kill you. This whole "war" is a waste of my taxpayer money.
2368	November 16, 2009	freedom vivian	Transform Drug Policy Foundation have released a paper called 'After the War on Drugs: Blueprint for Regulation" It is brilliant and has already been written.
2367	November 16, 2009	Chip Carlson	By legalizing drugs we should take the profit out of them.

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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