1980 War On Drugs

As the variables above are added up it, quickly becomes apparent that the “war on drugs,” during the mid 1980s-early 2000s had a negative impact on American life. With all the money spent and lives ruined, the United States came no closer to solving drug issues it had faced in the years prior. Citizens took the biggest brunt of this “war” with the fact that not only did they have to forcibly financially support the “war on drugs,” but in some cases, they had their civil liberties encroached upon or even completely violated. It could be argued that retrospectively looking at the “war on drugs” makes criticizing our country and the officials in charge easy, but when you actually look at the statistics and events surrounding this time period criticism

The War on Drugs continued well after President Ronald Regan left office. All of his predecessors continued to wage a war on street crime to win votes from the American people, Republicans and Democratic candidates alike began to dismantle social programing and implementing stiffer penalties toward convicted felons. Alexander reveals that by the turn of the twenty-first century 2 million people were cattle into penal systems and millions more were being discriminated against for employment,

Doris Marie Provine writes her book, Unequal under law: Race in the War on Drugs, to inform her audience that race plays a key role in the War on Drugs. She writes about how this war has become a war on race rather than a war intended to improve drug abuse. Provine begins her book with some background on the first account of the “war on drugs”. She describes how the prohibition age was the beginning of this war which targeted women and blacks. In Unequal under law, Provine explains how different race groups have been given crime labels. Africans have been labeled as the cocaine abusers, Mexicans are known as the weed smokers, and Chinese are deemed the opium addicts. She argues that the government supported the war on drugs although it knew

President Ronald Reagan officially announced the current drug war in 1982, before crack became an issue in the media or a crisis in poor black neighborhoods. A few years after the drug war was declared, crack began to spread rapidly in the poor black neighborhoods of Los Angeles and later emerged in cities across the country. The Reagan administration hired staff to publicize the emergence of crack cocaine in 1985 as part of a strategic effort to build public legislative support for the war. The media bonanza surrounding the “new demon drug” helped to catapult the War on Drugs from an ambitious federal policy to an actual war (Alexander 5).

The War on Drugs began in increments, first with President Nixon and secondly with President Reagan (Hill, Oliver, Marion, 2012). While under the Nixon administration, the Drug Enforcement Administration was developed due to the thought of how drugs can affect an individual as well as a community. Drugs did not only affect the user and the community, but also the families as well as children. Out of all the presidents, it is documented that President Nixon was one who had discussions about drugs more than any other president (Hill, et al., 2012).

When President Nixon conceptualized the war and President Reagan waged it, the American public was unconcerned about drugs. The extent of the drug problem in American was not what it is today.

Ultimately, the war on drugs grew because of the influence the first lady had on this movement. During Regan’s acceptance speech he mentioned things such as giving the state more power and tax cuts, but he did not mention a war on drugs. It wasn’t until the first lady traveled on behalf of her husband that drug problem was brought up. “The Reagan administration pressured foreign governments to act against producers and traffickers of opiates, cocaine, marijuana, and other illicit drugs” (Brands, 232). After the declaration of war on drugs statistics showed that Americans were using drugs more than when the Nancy Reagan anti drug campaign began. “Victories in the war on drugs were elusive” (Brands, 232) but states and the federal government

These people believe the war on drugs should not be viewed as a war against a particular collection of inanimate objects, but a convenient, yet inaccurate, representation. To ones that oppose the War on Drugs being all about race, they believe it should be understood as a special case of what war has always been-the engagement of force and violence against certain communities, and/or their institutions, in order to attain certain political objectives. Race has played an important role over the years in identifying the communities that became the targets of the drug war, consequently exposing their cultural practices and institutions to military-style attack and police control. Although the drug war has certainly sought to eradicate controlled substances and destroy the systems recognized for their circulation, this is only part of the story. Ones with this state of mind believe that state efforts to control drugs are also a way for dominant groups to express racial power. Overall, the significance of the drug trade and the oppression of African people and other people of color, they believe one must recognize the central role that drug trafficking has played and the maintenance of white supremacy worldwide. Addictive and harmful substances have historically been used to undermine societies and further white

The Drug Policy Alliance is an organization dedicated to making reforms to US drug laws, abolishing the failed the war on drugs, and advocating for harm reduction strategies. Located on their website, the article "Race and the Drug War", cites several troubling statistics and everyday realities that link the drug war to racism and discrimination. Among these, the fact that despite the rates of drug use being similar across racial lines, black Americans are more than three times as likely to be arrested for drug crimes. This is due to the fact that low-income, predominantly black neighborhoods are heavily patrolled for drug activity while higher-income neighborhoods are less scrutinized. The aim of the article is meant to persuade the reader

Through all of the pop music and big hair there was a growing epidemic of drug usage in the United States. To stop this Ronald Reagan began the War On Drugs, but since he has left office the war has been brought to a stand still. The War On Drugs that Ronald Reagan pursued in the 1980s has been put on the back burner, the amount of drugs and people using them has not decreased, all the while there has not been any new developments to try and prevent drug usage to further build up the arsenal against the War on Drugs.

There is a war going on. It is a war that has targeted, jailed, and killed millions of Americans. To see its profound impact, one does not even need to leave our nation 's borders. It is a civil war, that Consists of the U.S. Government, versus our country 's minority communities. It has spanned multiple generations and numerous presidential administrations. Declared by President Richard M. Nixon in June, 1971, the war on drugs has been one lost at great cost. In this paper, the argument will be presented that the war on drugs was a war on minority communities by disproportionately negatively affecting them through means of mass incarceration, ignoring a massive unknown disease, and gentrification.

This paper will discuss the topic of The War on Drugs in America and the harsh realities of what was occurring during the Nixon and Reagan era. It will take a look at past history and the origins of when this drug epidemic became such a hazard in America’s roots. It was first declared in 1971 by President Richard Nixon due to his strong belief that drug abuse was “public enemy number one.” With that, he installed widespread fear amongst citizens as well as creating several alternative means that sought to eliminate the problem. Then throughout President Ronald Reagan’s term, he refocused the nation’s attention back to the issue which led to a significant increase in incarcerations for nonviolent drug crimes. These were times where individuals slipped away from the norm and began experimenting in different areas such as opposition towards the government and social conformity in diverse groups. This then lead to the greater issue of The War on Drugs becoming a war on the people because of its effects on minority groups. The social justice sought by many was to end the racial discrimination placed by higher powers on these groups of people in means to gain political wealth.

The Reagan presidential campaign, ‘war on drugs’ happened to be one of the key reasons for the collapse of the government run prisons, as the campaign was effective in arrests and might have been one of the causes of overcrowding in prisons. The core motive for Reagan’s presidential campaign to wage a ‘war’ on drugs had been a consequence of the presumption that minorities were corrupting the moral stature of the American dream (Barak, 2007). The administration was one of the first reasons for the shift from government run to private prisons. The movement to campaign to exclude drugs from America was run between the years of Reagan’s presidency (1981 to 1989) and continued onward by other presidents (Price, 2006). The legislations that had

As U.S. Drug Policy has become more politicized, the number of laws for using, and possessing illegal substances has increased, and the number of those using illicit drugs has risen.  Though drug policies were created with the intent of protecting the public, a gap has developed between different groups - the “drug warriors” and the “legalizers”.  These polarizing groups advocate opposing, often politically-driven views that result in overly punitive drug penalties that are expensive, racially disparate, and totally ineffective. Consequently, movements inspiring a drug counter culture against this oppression has emerged in America and illicit drug use has increased.  By the second half of the 20th century the major importation of illegal narcotics and the drug war were just getting started.

According to Michelle Alexander, why and how has the “war on drugs” developed over the last 40 years? What are the main political and economic factors that led to the war on drugs, and what are the main political and economic factors that shaped it as it developed over the last four decades? Draw on material from the Foner textbook chapters 25 through 28 to supplement Alexander’s discussion of the political and economic context.