The MacNeil/Lehrer Report; Criminalization of Marijuana

ROBERT MacNEIL: This paraphernalia will be familiar to those who use marijuana. If the current drive to decriminalize it goes the way it appears to be going, such items may become a much more visible and familiar part of the American way of life.

Good evening. The campaign to decriminalize the use of marijuana is gaining strength. Seven states have already removed use of the drug from the list of criminal offenses. Similar legislation is pending in thirty-one other states and the District of Columbia. President Carter has called for decriminalization. According to a study by the National Governors` Conference, states that have decriminalized have shown a substantial savings in tax dollars. Numerous other public officials, appalled at the rising cost of enforcement -- officials like Mayor Abraham Beame of New York -- are supporting the removal of criminal penalties.

Tonight we examine what will happen to our society when - and it no longer seems to be a question of "if" -- using marijuana ceases to be an offense for which you can go to jail. Jim?

JIM LEHRER: Robin, decriminalization is a term often used interchangeably with legalization. Well, it shouldn`t be. When President Carter, for instance, says he favors decriminalization, he does not mean that pot could be sold on the open market like candy or chewing gum. Decriminalization means that possessing small amounts of the stuff would be handled like a traffic violation; a ticket would be issued and a fine levied. Criminal penalties would remain for those who sell or traffic in it. Dr. Peter Bourne, the President`s drug policy advisor, put the administration`s general position this way on March 14.

"We will continue to discourage marijuana use, but we feel criminal penalties that brand otherwise law-abiding people for life are neither effective nor an appropriate deterrent."

Keep in mind also that most marijuana laws are state laws, and Bourne also repeated what Carter said during the Presidential campaign, that what the states do on the matter is their business, and the federal government should stay out of it. Robin?

MacNEIL: Dr. Lester Grinspoon is a psychoanalyst and an Associate Professor of Psychiatry at Harvard Medical School. He`s an advocate of both decriminalizing and legalizing marijuana. He`s the author of Marijuana Reconsidered. Dr. Grinspoon, what will be the consequences to society of decriminalizing marijuana?

Dr. LESTE R GRINSPOON: First of all, society will no longer arrest in the United States 400,000 or more mostly young people every year at a cost of $600 million a year. I think that it will not result in

a large increment in the use of marijuana than we are presently having; that is, marijuana use is going up, but the data that we have from the State of Oregon, which was the first state to decriminalize, suggests that it`s not going up any faster there than elsewhere. And I don`t believe that it will result in a significant increase in the number of people who abuse marijuana. The National Commission estimated that about two percent of people abuse marijuana.

MacNEIL: What does "abusing it" mean?

GRINSPOON: Abusing it means using it very heavily -- every day; many times a day, very often. And the Commission felt that one of the reasons not to legalize marijuana was because if more people use it they will abuse it. Well, the fact of the matter is that that argument really doesn`t follow. People who don`t use marijuana now because it`s illegal are unlikely to abuse it. The people who abuse it are people who, because they are trying to deal with anxiety or depression or some kind of internal pain and they turn to some kind of psychoactive drug, most commonly alcohol, a far more dangerous drug -- some of them use marijuana in the same way, those people have already turned to marijuana, and it`s unlikely that that number will increase appreciably.

MacNEIL: Why would removing criminal penalties for marijuana use not result in an increase in its use?

GRINSPOON:I think there will be an increase in its use, but ...

MacNEIL: Any more increase than the increase that`s happening now?

GRINSPOON :I would have thought that it would have led to a larger increase, but as I say, the data from the state that`s been studied most -- Oregon -- indicates that the rise is not impressive; it`s just not significantly more than the rise around the country. So I just don`t believe that the criminal penalties affect the situation very much one way or the other.

MacNEIL: Thank you. Jim?

LEHRER: Other questions center around the effect decriminalization would have on the law, legal processes and the courts. Herman Graber is a former Assistant District Attorney in New York City who prosecuted many marijuana cases. He`s now in private practice. Mr. Graber, what would be the effect, in your opinion?

HERMAN GRABER: I believe that there would be a marked decrease in the backlog of cases pending in our criminal courts. I further believe that there would be a salutory effect of returning people from the criminal side of life -- in other words, having to be in fear of arrest for possession of marijuana; these people will no longer be outside the law, they`ll be returned to within the law, if you will, and these people now will be able to become part of society. I think because so many people do feel that this particular prohibition against the use of marijuana is wrong and this removal will increase their respect for law, we stand to profit in every way possible. As has been pointed out by Mr. MacNeil, the cost of administering our courts, of law enforcement, will be tremendously reduced. And it would result, I think, in increased respect for law and more law and order.

LEHRER: Mr. Graber, you haven`t always felt this way about marijuana, I understand.

GRABER: No, I have not.

LEHRER: You were, in fact, known as a real go-for-the-maximum prosecutor on cases like this in the past. What happened to change your mind?

GRABER: When I first started in prosecution I believed that marijuana and heroin were one and the same thing. It was a lack of knowledge of what the drug was and what the problem was. I began to see in the sixties, with the increase in the use of marijuana, young people being arrested, labeled as criminals for life, and their parents becoming extremely upset by what had occurred; and realizing what these young people were doing was not much different than what their parents were doing when they would get drunk at night or when they would go out. And after I left the District Attorney`s office and went into private practice I met these people on a different level than I had met them when I has a prosecutor, and I began to realize that these are not criminals. They`re young people -- the majority of them, in any event -- they`re intelligent, decent people, and their only crime is a desire to use a certain type of drug for their own particular reasons. And I could not understand, at that point, why we are penalizing these people and we are stigmatizing these people for doing something which really affects no one but themselves.

LEHRER: Mr. Graber, thank you. Robin?

MacNEIL: Let`s get another angle on the law enforcement aspect of the marijuana problem. Sterling Johnson is the Special Narcotics Prosecutor for New York City. He`s a former Assistant U.S. District Attorney and was a policeman for twelve years. First of all, Mr. Johnson, how would it affect the police to have marijuana decriminalized?

STERLING JOHNSON: I think the decriminalization of marijuana really is codifying a situation that exists right now. Marijuana has been decriminalized over the past few years. For instance, members of the New York City Police Department -- the Narcotics Squad -generally do not put any enforcement efforts into making arrests for marijuana. The big problem in New York is harder drugs: heroin, cocaine, and that nature. Most of the narcotic arrests, or marijuana arrests, that are made in New York City are made by police officers who will stop someone for stealing an automobile of burglary. They have with them marijuana, and the marijuana charge is added onto the underlying charge.

MacNEIL: Because the law at the moment requires that an arresting officer prosecute.

JOHNSON: That`s correct; so I would disagree with Mr. Graber that it would reduce the backlog as far as people being arrested for marijuana. You`re still going to have that underlying charge of grand larceny auto, burglary, et cetera. But personally -- or professionally -- I am in favor of decriminalization of marijuana because of the course that it puts upon the enforcement people, upon my agency. Right now, if an individual gets caught with a misdemeanor amount of marijuana and he wants to go to trial, he`s entitled to a jury trial of six jurors, a judge; and I think it`s crazy, with the backlog of cases that I and the other prosecutors have.

MacNEIL: Do you see bad effects resulting from the decriminalization of marijuana, that it might lead to use of harder drugs, or any other of the bad effects that are sometimes mentioned by the opponents of this?

JOHNSON: I don`t think there`s any empirical evidence to say that the use of marijuana is going to have someone start using heroin, if that`s the drug that you`re referring to. Some people do start heroin and have used marijuana, but I don`t think that you can show a causal relationship between the two.

MacNEIL: Thank you. Jim?

LEHRER: Not everyone agrees, of course, that decriminalizing marijuana will have a good, or benign, effect. Congressman Robin Beard, Republican of Tennessee, definitely does not agree. The Congressman is a member of the House Select Committee on Narcotics Abuse and Control, which held hearings on the subject last week. Congressman, what do you think the effect would be if marijuana is decriminalized?

Rep. ROBIN BEARD: Jim, as you mentioned, we just completed three days of hearings where we had witnesses expounding on both positions -- against and for; and Dr. Greenspan was one of the witnesses. Dr. Greenspan appeared with the executive director for NORMAL, and I believe Dr. Greenspan is on that board.

LEHRER: NORMAL is a national group that is pushing for decriminalization of marijuana laws, right?

BEARD: Yes, and their executive director also testified. As a result of the hearings, I felt that decriminalization was not the way to go. And I must say, in being very honest, I was somewhat against it -- I was leaning that way before then. Dr. Greenspan continues to reflect on studies such as the Oregon data. We had witnesses from the State of Oregon, and they testified with a great deal of pride that there was only a "five percent increase since we have decriminalized marijuana." The witness was a state Senator who had introduced the bill and who seems to be pushing also for allowing individuals to grow it in their back yards; another was the Human Resources director.

LEHRER: What is your view? Do you think that it would increase the usage?

BEARD: I think we have to go with the statistics; and let`s look at the State of Oregon. They state a five percent increase, but what they don`t say is that that`s for from eighteen years of age all the way up to the oldest citizen. The fact of the matter is that when I asked for a breakdown, the increase on ages between eighteen and twenty-nine was sixteen, seventeen, eighteen percent; and if that`s not significant then maybe I`m playing with the wrong set of figures. Every single state that has decriminalized has testified there has been an increase.

LEHRER: All right, now let`s take some of the points that the other two gentlemen made. For instance, the question on law enforcement. Mr. Graber said that it would actually increase law and order in a general way to decriminalize marijuana. Do you agree with that?

BEARD: I get quite concerned when I hear that. I think to a certain extent that`s just one more step of permissiveness that`s going to hurt our society. It`s a problem, without any question. And first of all, I am not for sending young people to prison; I don`t think that`s the answer, and I don`t go that route. But I`ve talked to Dr. Baird, who runs a free drug- related clinic in Harlem, and he has pleaded -- he`s very emotional about it; at times, people think he`s too emotional -- to please not decriminalize marijuana, to make it seem to be somewhat more acceptable, because he feels, in working with these kids --he knows because he`s on the streets -- that it leads to harder drugs. I`ve talked to police officers in Harlem. I`ve gone through, and I know Mr. Johnson stated that they`re not arresting marijuana pushers; well, I know for a fact they`re not arresting heroin pushers. Right on the street corners -- I`ve been in a car with the police officers going through Harlem. They point out the heroin pushers. I say, "Why don`t you arrest them?" They say, "For every one that we would arrest there`s ten to take their place." So is the next step to say "Decriminalize heroin"?

LEHRER: Congressman, let me ask you this: You said that you`re not in favor of putting these young people in jail. You do have an alternative to decriminalization. Briefly, what is it?

BEARD: It`s not an original idea; they`re doing it in the State of Minnesota, they did it in Sacramento, California. It`s called a citation diversion program. They don`t take the criminal aspect away from it, but what they do is if they arrest a young man he is fined, but he is then also required to go to a drug education course for which he has to pay the expense of conducting that course, at which time his name is on the record. But during this probationary period, for a certain length of time, if he is not caught or if there is no recurrence then his record will be clean so that he won`t have to live the rest of his life with this penalty.

LEHRER: Now, if that person does not want to do that, they would then go to jail.

BEARD: That`s correct, he has a decision. And I must say, all of them make the decision to go into the course. From preliminary indications, everyone is extremely excited about it. Eighty-one percent of the judges who have responded to questionnaires have said it`s a great system -- it gives them an alternative.

LEHRER: Let`s see if the people in New York are excited about it, Congressman. Robin?

MacNEIL: Mr. Graber, what do you think of a scheme like that?

GRABER: I think first of all it would be totally ineffective. I think the experience here in New York, with NACC and then DACC -the Narcotics Addiction Control Commission and the Drug Addiction Control Commission -- has shown that even where you give the person a choice between jail or the program, if you will, it just doesn`t work. I think a person who has a drug problem -- and I question whether the use of marijuana indicates a drug problem, but assuming it is a drug problem if a person is not motivated to change his ways and change his habits I don`t think any kind of such a program would be effective. I think what it will do is give the judges an opportunity to cop out on a responsibility, and that responsibility is either to find that the law is unreasonable or throw this young person in jail. I think it would just stigmatize our young people, and for no good reason for the benefit of society.

MacNEIL: Let`s ask Dr. Grinspoon. Are normal.-- if there`s such a thing -- users of marijuana people with a drug problem? Would they respond in any way like a user of hard drugs to a drug treatment program?

GRINSPOON: It seems to me that they are people with a drug problem, only in my opinion less of a drug problem than people who are social drinkers. It seems to me what Mr. Beard is talking about is a kind of mandatory -- you have a choice of being treated this way by the law, or you have a mandatory rehabilitation program, which I think is not a very good idea. I`m all in favor of drug education, but I think it`s more important to- educate people who use a lot of alcohol, for example, or cigarettes, or amphetamines, or barbiturates. That is to say, if we consider how important education is in relation to the relative harmfulness of these drugs, most people who smoke marijuana are being sent, then, for a rehabilitation program, and I don`t know what they`re rehabilitating.

MacNEIL: What do you think of the Congressman`s idea, Mr. Johnson?

JOHNSON: It`s very interesting, and I find myself seeing that the argument does have some merit.

MacNEIL: To come back to your previous point, would the New York police be any keener, considering all their other work, to pick up suspected marijuana offenders than they are now on a program like that?

JOHNSON: Practically, it would not work. I recall Congressman Beard coming up to Harlem and seeing people selling drugs out in the open, and that did happen. That situation no longer exists. Because of their trip up there they are locking up people for selling heroin.

MacNEIL: Boy, you`ve had an effect, Congressman, in that case! One trip. (Laughing.)

(General laughter.)

JOHNSON: But heroin is still being dealt in Harlem, but it`s done on the inside. One of the problems that we face is a fiscal problem here in New York. We do not have funds to arrest as many heroin pushers as we`d like to, and if you added marijuana sellers or users to the list it just would not work. We have here in Manhattan -- New York County alone -- over 100,000 arrests a year, and this is not including the naked marijuana arrests; and if you add them you could get 300,000 arrests a year.

MacNEIL: Congressman, you heard the reaction to your scheme here. I`d like to ask you this: Has society`s attitude really changed substantially about marijuana, or is it just the pressure from hard-pressed officials who are having trouble getting the police personnel and the money and the court space and the prison space to enforce the present laws?

BEARD: I think you`d have to say it`s been a little bit of both. I think also it`s been the fact that you have a diversity of medical opinions as to the use of marijuana. You have medical reports that say that it`s extremely harmful or could be harmful; you have other reports that say it couldn`t be. But you`ve got a lot of families whose children have been busted, who now have a record, who`ve gone to jail -- all of a sudden, they start getting a little bit concerned, and I can understand that concern. I can understand Mr. Johnson`s frustrations and the frustrations of the two police officers that I was extremely impressed with that I drove around with, and they were frustrated. They talked about busting a heroin pusher - - one of the big boys -- and they had everything they needed, and it had been three years and then you have to get him to court. So I can understand these frustrations, but every time we find a problem and figure out we don`t know how to solve it, we say "Let`s make it all right and make it acceptable." I guess if you want to be corny about it, and everyone can come out with their backlog in courts and this and that, the fact is that I have an eleven-year-old boy and a six-year old girl, and I`m going to do my best to bring them up in a way -and this may not be relevant, but I want them to feel that even in addition to what I say to them that there`s something wrong with it, that it`s not right. Fifty-two percent of the people who stop smoking marijuana do it as a result of the fear of being arrested, and that is from an actual study done by the government. You never hear that percentage at all. There`s a combination of reasons why people are saying, "Well, let`s go on to something else."

MacNEIL: Somebody disagrees with you here on that, Congressman. You were saying that`s not true, Dr. Grinspoon?

GRINSPOON: I`m not saying it`s not true, it`s a figure which I`ve never heard of.

GRABER: I have never heard of that figure, either. I don`t know how they would arrive at that figure.

BEARD: I would refer you to the Senate hearings, Senator Eastland`s hearings, and it was the testimony made by Dr. DuPont that the majority of individuals -- the number one deterrent for people to stop smoking marijuana was the fear of being arrested. And that is in the hearings.

GRABER: I agree with Congressman Beard`s statement that I don`t want my children using marijuana, and I don`t think anyone else wants their using marijuana. My position is that however if you do have someone with a small amount of marijuana and that`s all, I think it`s crazy -- at least, here in this part of the country -to waste prosecutorial and enforcement energies just to go after these individuals when there are so many other drugs that are more dangerous that we could be spending our time with.

MacNEIL: Thank you. Jim?

LEDRER: Let`s talk-about the next step -- or another drug, Mr. Johnson and Congressman and the other gentlemen in New York. For instance, Dr. Bourne, the President`s man, has suggested that the administration is also studying the possibility of some changes in the cocaine laws. How do you feel about that, Mr. Johnson?

JOHNSON: I would be opposed to that, because if you`re talking about cocaine I think it`s a different drug, and the next step beyond that, as Congressman Beard said, would be the legalization of heroin, and I am against that. I would be against the legalization or decriminalization of cocaine.

LEHRER: Mr. Graber, where do you come down on the cocaine question?

GRABER: I feel that the present laws regarding cocaine are extreme in terms of their penalties. The use of the comparison between cocaine and heroin, as just been done, has been the basic problem in trying to find a solution to the marijuana and cocaine problem. It has always been a very favorite way of prosecutors and others in law enforcement to justify the prohibitions against cocaine or marijuana to say there`s a correlation between them, and I think that`s what`s happened here; that if we decriminalize cocaine or lessen the laws then the next step obviously will be heroin. I don`t think that you can discuss cocaine or marijuana in the same room with heroin. Heroin has nothing to do with cocaine, heroin has nothing to do with marijuana. I think it`s been substantially shown throughout the past ten years in all our discussions and all these studies and so on.

LEHRER: Let me ask the Congressman about that. I would assume that if you wouldn`t go for marijuana you certainly wouldn`t go for cocaine, is that right?

BEARD: It really dismays me to hear that, because we say that will never happen. But we had the mayor of -- I believe it was Gary, Indiana, who headed the subcommittee for the League of Cities regarding the drug problem. And that subcommittee came out recommending in a resolution the decriminalization of marijuana, cocaine and heroin. So where does it end? What happened to organized crime? Who deals with the drugs? Who deals with marijuana? The same people, the statistics show, that sell marijuana also sell, in many cases, your harder drugs. They are now finding, in the states that have decriminalized marijuana -- and I say this in relation to cocaine, because the same thing will happen to cocaine when they get around to decriminalizing that -- that...

LEHRER: Do you think they`re going to? Is that next on the agenda?

BEARD: Why not? I`m still surprised that we`re saying, "We couldn`t handle it, it`s gotten too big for us. Let`s go and just make it okay for an ounce or less." Nobody`s remembered to say an ounce can make up to fifty to seventy-five cigarettes. A kid walking around a grammar school or high school with an ounce of marijuana, now that it`s just more or less a traffic-ticket violation, is going to be a little bit more willing to take that risk than he is today.

LEHRER: Do you agree with that, Dr. Grinspoon?

GRINSPOON: I think with all these drugs it`s a question of which imposes the greatest risk -- the use of the drug or the prohibition against it? I think it`s clear in the case of marijuana that the laws impose more risk than any inherent psychopharmacological property of the drug.

MacNEIL: I`m afraid we have to end it there for tonight. Thank you very much, Congressman. Good night, Jim.

LEHRE R: Good night, Robin.

MacNEIL: And thank you all here. Jim Lehrer and I will be back tomorrow evening. I`m Robert MacNeil. Good night.