Illustration by Vidushi Yadav for the Association for Women’s Rights in Development.
BY: SOPHIE LOVERING, SUMMER 2020 COLLABORATOR AT POWER IN PLACE
Black Americans account for 30 percent of all drug-related arrests, even though only 12.5 percent of substance users are black [1]. Black and white Americans use substances at equal rates; however, black Americans are about six times more likely to be incarcerated for drug-related offenses than their white peers [1]. In court, prosecutors are twice as likely to pursue mandatory minimum sentences for black defendants than white defendants, and black defendants are less likely to evade these mandatory minimums [1].
In 1971, President Richard Nixon established the war on drugs, which in turn increased sentencing and enforcement actions for low-level drug offenses [1]. 15 years after Nixon’s presidency, Congress passed the Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1986, establishing mandatory minimum sentencing for drug-related offenses [2]. The increased criminalization of substance use tied with increased drug law enforcement led to the American phenomenon of mass incarceration. Since 1980, the number of American arrests for drug possession has tripled and today one-fifth of the prison population is serving time for a drug-related offense [1].
This mass incarceration has differentially impacted black Americans. The Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1986 included sentences for offenses involving crack cocaine, used more commonly by black Americans, that were one hundred times more severe than sentences for offenses involving the equally dangerous powder cocaine, used more often by white Americans [2]. As aforementioned, prosecutors are more likely to seek the mandatory minimum sentence for a black defendant than a white defendant even when the defendants are charged with the same crime [3].
Often, the criminal justice reform narrative has centered on men. It is also important to recognize how the war on drugs has affected women, and specifically women of color. Since the war on drugs and subsequent tough on crime initiatives, the number of female inmates in the United States has increased by 646 percent, which is nearly double the rate for men [4]. In 1988, Congress amended the Anti-Drug Abuse Act and applied mandatory minimum sentences to any member of a drug trafficking conspiracy; this includes activities such as “living where drugs are sold, being present during a drug sale, or counting money” [4]. Considering not only that women are expected to contribute to the household but also that women often remain in relationships with men involved with drugs because of fear of assault, women are frequently at a heightened and unfair risk of incarceration [4].
Black women are almost twice as likely as white women to be incarcerated for drug-related offenses, even though drug use occurs at similar rates across racial groups [5]. In addition to these continued racial disparities in sentencing, black women were unjustly labeled “welfare queens” in the 1980s [6]. Policymakers and the media depicted black women as unfeminine cheats who gave birth to “crack babies,” wrongly blaming them for the cause of the social and economic decline of the late 20th century [6].
Prejudiced people and laws have impacted not only how many people get arrested, but also who gets arrested. Drug law enforcement initiatives have targeted black Americans. Often, women who are in fact victims are incarcerated on conspiracy charges, and this disproportionately impacts black women. Unfair arrest practices and sentencing create cycles of not only poverty, but also racism, and perpetuate long-standing ills of American society. To address these wrongs, we must fundamentally amend drug laws and their enforcement practices and examine our own prejudices.
References
[1] Pearl, Betsy. “Ending the War on Drugs: By the Numbers.” Center for American Progress. June 27, 2018. https://www.americanprogress.org/issues/criminal-justice /reports/2018/06/27/452819/ending-war-drugs-numbers/.
[2] HISTORY.COM Editors. “War on Drugs.” May 31, 2017. https://www.history.com/topics/crime/the-war-on-drugs#section_6.
[3] Drug Policy Alliance. “The Drug War, Mass Incarceration and Race.” January 25, 2018. http://www.drugpolicy.org/resource/drug-war-mass-incarceration-and-race-englishspanish.
[4] Mesic, Aldina. “Women and the War on Drugs.” Public Health Post. May 16, 2017. https://www.publichealthpost.org/research/women-and-the-war-on-drugs/.
[5] Drug Policy Alliance. “Women and the Drug War.” https://www.drugpolicy.org/issues/women-drug-war.
[6] Harris-Perry, Melissa. “The rest of the story: Black women and the War on Drugs.” The Undefeated. September 15, 2016. https://theundefeated.com/features/the-rest-of-story-black-women-and-the-her-story-of-the-war-on-drugs-jay-z-melissa-harris-perry-nyt/.
Sophie Lovering is a junior at the University of Pennsylvania majoring in Philosophy, Politics, and Economics and minoring in American Sign Language and Deaf Studies. She has a passion for criminal justice reform and is involved in Beyond Arrests: Re-Thinking Systematic Oppression.