Article by: Matt McQuaid

The past few years have seen considerable progress in terms of eliminating the pointless, costly, and archaic prohibitionist policies the federal government collectively refers to as the “War on Drugs.” California is moving toward legalizing marijuana, President Obama has ordered the DEA to stop raids on medicinal marijuana facilities, and sitting members of Congress (such as Ron Paul and Barney Frank) have come forward in sharp criticism of the federal government’s drug enforcement policies. There is, however, one area of the drug war that drastically needs improvement: the abolishment of mandatory minimums.

Mandatory minimums are sentencing guidelines at the state and federal level that provide for a minimum number of years in prison upon conviction of certain crimes regardless of circumstances or other mitigating factors, among them possession of drugs. In 1986, Congress first passed mandatory minimum sentencing guidelines for drug offenders. The very idea of mandatory minimums is unfair because it ignores judicial discretion and circumstance. Judges are often forced to hand out lengthy prison sentences for non-violent crimes that they don’t see fit due to mandatory minimum statutes.

For one, mandatory minimums have disproportionately affected racial minorities unfairly. African Americans constitute 60 percent of people serving a sentence of 20 years or more for federal drug offenses, along with 20 percent Hispanics and 17 percent Whites. Black males sentenced nationwide receive prison sentences for drug crimes in state courts 52 percent of the time, compared to 34 percent for white males. African Americans make up approximately 12 percent of the population and are 13 percent of the drug users, yet they constitute 38 percent of all drug arrests and 59 percent of those convicted of drug offenses. In a country that has made notable progress in terms of healing a racially troubled past, mandatory minimums are the modern-day Jim Crow laws.

Mandatory Minimums have also contributed to a dramatic increase in prison population. From 1985 to 1995, the total U.S. prison population increased by over 80 percent because of drug sentencing. Moreover, a great deal of people who are incarcerated for non-violent drug offenses are kept there longer than people who are incarcerated for crimes such as rape, murder or robbery because of these nonsensical laws. Incarcerating citizens is not only incredibly expensive, but considering the high rate of recidivism among people who are convicted felons, mandatory minimums are arguably creating a new class of criminals at an alarmingly high rate.

Americans are stubborn. All too often it seems simple to dig our heels in the ground and forge forward rather than to admit something simply isn’t working, cut our losses and move on. Illegal drugs are responsible for an immeasurable amount of deaths, tragedies, and heartbreaks throughout our country, but locking up the problem hasn’t made it go away. It’s time for a new approach: abolish mandatory minimums.