The New York Times has a disturbing story on mission creep by the DEA in the disastrous war on drugs. From the Times:

The Drug Enforcement Administration has been transformed into a global intelligence organization with a reach that extends far beyond narcotics, and an eavesdropping operation so expansive it has to fend off foreign politicians who want to use it against their political enemies, according to secret diplomatic cables.

The dramatic growth in the size and scope of the American drug war bureaucracy is actually a solid example of how big, intrusive government is both perpetuated and expanded.

In 1970, President Richard Nixon signed into law the Comprehensive Drug Abuse and Control Act, which consolidated and updated all previous federal drug laws. Part of this legislation was the Controlled Substances Act, which remains the legal framework for the contemporary war on drugs.

In 1973, Congress created the federal Drug Enforcement Administration, consolidating the Office of Drug Abuse Law Enforcement (ODALE) and the Bureau of Narcotics and Dangerous Drugs; the new agency also included agents from the U.S. Customs Service and the Central Intelligence Agency. The 1973 DEA had fewer than 1,500 special agents and a budget of around $75 million.

In 2009, the DEA had over 5,200 special agents and its budget was over $2.6 billion. Moreover, as the Times article continues, “The D.E.A. now has 87 offices in 63 countries and close partnerships with governments that keep the Central Intelligence Agency at arm’s length.”

In other words, American taxpayers are now the proud owners of the world’s drug police force, and then some.

But the DEA is just one part of a vast, and ever-expanding American drug war bureaucracy. As Independence Institute research director Dave Kopel and I describe in a 2005 monograph for the Liberal Institute of the Friedrich Naumann Foundation (Potsdam, Germany):

In 1989, President George W. Bush created the cabinet level Office of National
Drug Control Policy (ONDCP) to oversee and coordinate U.S. drug policy. In charge
of the new agency is a „Drug Czar.“ In the United States – a constitutional republic
– a high level government official in charge of a powerful internal law enforcement
agency is referred to by the same term as an absolute Russian tyrant…The U.S. Justice Department operates its own drug intelligence agency.

The new Department of Homeland security, created in response to the Sept.
11th terrorist attacks, devotes considerable resources to fighting drugs rather than
fighting terrorism. The Department of Homeland Security is in charge of Immigration
and Customs Enforcement (ICE), the U.S. Coast Guard, and the Border Patrol,
all of which are heavily involved in narcotics interdiction and enforcement.
The U.S. Department of State has a Bureau of International Law Enforcement
and Narcotics Affairs.

For fiscal year 2005, the ONDCP is scheduled to distribute over $12,000,000,000
to a variety of federal agencies-above and beyond the agencies’ own budgets-for
the drug war, including the Department of Defense, Homeland Security, both the
Justice and State Departments.

In addition, the ONDCP conducts a public relations advertising campaigns
against drug users, and against citizen efforts to change American drug policies.
One television commercial claims that Americans who smoke marijuana are helping
terrorists.

The federal government organizes and leads multi-jurisdictional, multi-agency
narcotics task forces combining local and state police agencies throughout the
United States. Just in Colorado (a state with less than 2% of the U.S. population),
there are at least 20 such task forces operating. Thus, the federal government
takes a lead role in directing state and local law enforcement of state and local
drug laws. Such federal control is contrary to the American Constitution, which,
as James Madison explained, includes the principle that state and local law enforcement
would be independent of the federal government.

The domestic federal drug war budget is over $20,000,000,000 dollars today;
add in state and local spending and the total exceeds $40,000,000,000.
To put this in perspective, the average monthly Social Security retirement
check in the U.S. in 1972 was $177. Presently, the payment averages slightly more
than $900 a month. If, however, Social Security benefits had increased at the
same rate as drug war spending, today’s check would be around $30,000 a month.

For an in-depth look at the consequences (both to American taxpayers and citizens of other countries) of being the world drug police, check out the chapter “A Foreign Policy Disaster” in the book, “The New Prohibition: Voices of Dissent Challenge the Drug War” (Accurate Press, 2004). Also co-authored by myself and Dave Kopel.

Ever heard of the Colorado Commission on Criminal and Juvenile Justice (or CCJJ)?  On this week’s Devil’s Advocate, I am joined by Colorado State Public Defender Doug Wilson and Adams County District Attorney Don Quick, both members of the commission, to check on what issues the commission has taken up this year, and what kind of legislative recommendations might come out of the CCJJ in the next General Assembly.  That’s tomorrow, November 12 at 8:30 PM on Colorado Public Television 12.  Re-broadcast the following Monday at 1:30PM.

Our friends at the libertarian litigation firm the Institute for Justice (IJ) are trying to fight the insane world of civil asset forfeiture laws. Where the police can take your property without arrest, without prosecution, and without much of a reason. Where you must prove that you are innocent while fighting the presumption of guilt. Talk about turning the justice system on its head! Take a look at how ridiculous this crazy world is in this new IJ video:

In their massive Policing for Profit report, IJ graded each state’s asset forfeiture laws, and how they protect citizen’s property. Unfortunately, only 3 states in the entire country received a grade of “B” or better, with Colorado getting a hard-earned “C.” Our Justice Policy Initiative Director Mike Krause wrote briefly about the report and Colorado’s asset forfeiture laws in this article.

In May, Governor Ritter signed into law six criminal justice reform bills generated out of the work of the Colorado Commission on Criminal and Juvenile Justice (CCJJ). On this week’s Devil’s Advocate (still loving this new name!), State Representative Claire Levy (D, Boulder) and Adams County District Attorney Don Quick, both members of the commission, join me to discuss the significance of the CCJJ bills and where the work of the commission might go from here. That’s this Friday at 8:30 PM on KBDI, Channel 12, re-broadcast the following Monday at 1:00 PM.

On April 15, the Colorado House of Representatives overwhelmingly passed House Bill 1352, which nibbles at the edges of some of the more egregious aspects of the disastrous war on drugs by reforming some of Colorado’s controlled substance statutes.

This is a hugely important step for Colorado lawmakers in taking back their rightful prerogative to both write, and when necessary, re-write the state’s criminal code from the irrational drug law regime foisted on Coloradans by the federal government

In 1992, Colorado lawmakers enacted the Uniform Controlled Substances Act (USCA, Article 18 of Colorado’s criminal code).  The act was written to “complement” the federal Controlled Substances Act, and designed to bring state drug laws in to conformity with federal drug laws. The act, among many other things, created numerous new drug offenses in Colorado, and sentencing enhancements for those offenses.

In our Constitutional Republic, the authority and responsibility to write the state’s criminal law lies with the legislature.  In other words, the 1992 General Assembly willingly subjugated its prerogative to write Colorado’s criminal law to the dictates of federal drug war bureaucrats. What was the result?

Over the last several decades, the percentage of inmates whose most serious sentencing offense is a drug offense has quadrupled to around 20 percent of Colorado’s prison population. Drug offenders are by far the single largest category of new admissions to Colorado prisons at around 23 percent of annual admissions.

There are more drug offenders in Colorado prisons today than the entire prison population 25 years ago when the state’s inmate population was around 3,500.

In a January 1992 issue paper, published before the UCSA was enacted, Independence Institute Research Director Dave Kopel laid out the dangers in allowing unelected and unaccountable federal employees to decide Colorado law, asking:

Is an increment of presumed advantage in the drug war worth the price of warrantless searches, extreme and irrational punishments, pointless additional prison crowding, expansion of prosecutors’ power to take property from people never found guilty of a crime, and further abdication of state powers to federal bureaucrats?

The drug policy reform recommendations incorporated into House Bill 1352 are actually quite modest, having been exhaustively vetted by both the Drug Policy Task force of the Colorado Commission on Criminal and Juvenile Justice and by the voting members of the Commission itself, which includes representatives of the Attorney General’s Office, the Public Defender’s Office, the Department of Public Safety, prosecutors, chief’s of police, county sheriffs, drug treatment providers, legislators, and numerous other interested parties.

The Independence Institute has long advocated drug law reform.  In this 2005 issue paper, “Getting Smart on Crime: Time to Reform Colorado’s Drug Offense Sentencing Policies,” I recommend lowering both use and possession of illegal drugs from felony crimes to misdemeanors and the creation of sentencing grid for controlled substance offenses separate and distinct (and much less draconian) from the sentencing structure for violent and property crimes.

Here is what HB 1352 does with regard to drug possession offenses:

Here is what HB 1352 does with regard to marijuana offenses:

The bill is sponsored by Colorado Springs Republican Representative Mark Waller and by Senators Pat Steadman (D-Denver) and Shawn Mitchell (R-Broomfield). HB 1352 now heads to the Senate, and is scheduled to be heard by the Senate Judiciary Committee on Monday, April 26.