Nov-Dec Drugs Part 1

West Coast Publishing NFL LD Illegal Drugs
Table of Contents
Topic Overview.........................................................................................................................................2
Resolved: The abuse of illegal drugs ought to be treated as a matter of public health, not of criminal justice.....................2 Lindsay Van Luvanee Idaho State University........................................................................................................................2
SECTION 2. RESEARCH GUIDE...........................................................................................................8 AFFIRMATIVE SAMPLE CASE..........................................................................................................11 AFFIRMATIVE EVIDENCE EXTENSIONS........................................................................................13

PUBLIC HEALTH SOLVES CRIMINAL ABUSES..........................................................................................................13 ILLEGAL DRUGS CAUSE HEALTH CONCERNS AND DEATH.................................................................................14 TREATMENT AND AVOIDING DEATH RATES ARE MOST IMPORTANT..............................................................15 PUBLIC HEALTH COSTS LESS THAN CRIMINAL JUSTICE......................................................................................16 DRUG ABUSE IS EMPIRICALLY A PUBLIC HEALTH ISSUE....................................................................................17 DRUG TREATMENT FOCUSES ON HEALTH IMPROVEMENT.................................................................................18 ADDICTION MAKES ILLEGAL DRUG ABUSE A HEALTH ISSUE............................................................................19 .............................................................................................................................................................................................19 DRUG USE IS INEVITABLY A HEALTH ISSUE............................................................................................................20 CRIMINAL JUSTICE DOESN'T SOLVE PUBLIC HEALTH..........................................................................................21 TREATING DRUG ABUSE AS A MATTER OF PUBLIC HEALTH MAINTAINS FEDERALISM............................22 TREATING DRUG ABUSE AS PUBLIC HEALTH IS A STATE ISSUE.......................................................................23
NEGATIVE CASE..................................................................................................................................24 NEGATIVE EVIDENCE EXTENSIONS..............................................................................................26

PUBLIC HEALTH DOESN'T CHANGE DRUG USE PATTERNS..................................................................................26 DRUG ABUSE LEADS TO CRIME...................................................................................................................................27 DRUG ABUSE SHOULD BE TREATED BOTH AS HEALTH AND CRIMINAL.........................................................28 DRUGS SHOULD NOT BE LEGALIZED.........................................................................................................................29 CRIMINAL JUSTICE SOLVES PUBLIC HEALTH CONCERNS...................................................................................30 ADDICTION IS NO EXCUSE............................................................................................................................................31 PRENATAL DRUG ABUSE SHOULD BE A CRIMINAL OFFENSE.............................................................................32 PRENATAL DRUG ABUSE IS HEINOUS........................................................................................................................33 PUNITIVE MEASURES ARE MILD BUT EFFECTIVE..................................................................................................34
Topic Overview
Resolved: The abuse of illegal drugs ought to be treated as a matter of public health, not of criminal justice. Lindsay Van Luvanee Idaho State University
The abuse of illegal drugs has been a contentious issue, both in the United States and around the world, since the mid 1800s. The controversy surrounding the abuse has been about whether it should be treated as a health concern or as a matter of criminal justice. Currently, between one half and one third of prison inmates meet the standards for drug abuse and dependency, and of those many are at risk for associated health problems. However, this doesn't resolve the questions raised about how to view illegal drug abuse. Central to this is the role of governments to either prevent or punish illegal drug abuse. This brief is designed to introduce the issues relevant to the resolution and provide resources for continued research. It has three main components. The first section provides an overview of the issues and includes and examination of key terms and resolutional analysis. The second provides a research guide to assist in further, independent research about the resolution. Finally, it provides a sample affirmative and negative case, as well as additional evidence. SECTION 1. THE DEBATE OVER ILLEGAL DRUGS This section is meant to introduce the relevant issues pertaining to the status of the abuse of illegal drugs. First, it discusses how the abuse of drugs has been treated historically, as well as the justifications for treating it as either a public health or a criminal justice issue. Second, it defines the terms of the resolution and describes the ways that these terms will likely frame the debate. Finally, it provides a couple potential strategies and case areas for both the affirmative and the negative. 1. A. OVERVIEW History of Illegal Drugs Throughout history, the purpose of drugs and the legal status of them has seemed to be in a constant state of flux. Drugs that were once used to aid in other addictions, such as cocaine have since become illegal, and other drugs that were once illegal, such as marijuana, are starting to become relics of health. The original source of drug control was that of opium in China in the mid 1800s when Chinese officials were afraid that opium addiction in the country was disrupting the strong position it had in trade. At the time China still had one of the largest populations on the planet, about ten million of which were addicted to opium, which was an import from the British. In order to counteract this unbalanced trade, China hoped to stifle the opium market within its borders. It did so by placing stiff penalties such as floggings, imprisonment, and strangulation for opium users and traffickers. Chinese officials also started confiscating opium from British ships whenever they would reach shore. Since Britain's trade of opium to China was its primary export, the British were not so willing to give up their key export to their best customer. This sparked a war between China and Britain that lasted three years until a treaty was signed that ceded Hong Kong to British rule. The prohibition of opium, however, remained intact. In 1909, the United States followed China's suit and banned the importation, possession, and smoking of opium, marking the first time in the United States that non-medical use of a substance was outlawed. It was still unregulated in the medical field and still allowed many opiates to be produced and remained widespread in homes because the medical versions were so available. Until the early 1920s, cocaine was legally imported and frequently used by pharmaceutical companies. It had many restrictions much like the ones alcohol has today. For example, it could not be sold to minors, known addicts, in large quantities, or for recreation. Due to lack of information about the way that addiction worked, it was commonly used as a cure for alcoholism and opium addiction, and could be found in household products such as Coca-Cola.
In 1920 itself, the prohibition of alcohol was enacted in the United States. Many scholars believe this came about because of a disproportionately high protestant immigrant population, large political names and interest groups that fought for temperance, and influence from nine other North American and European countries. There were many reasons for prohibitions repeal in 1933. There were vast public outcries. People believed that the role of state governments had been violated. The federal government was suffering due to lack of tax income from alcohol sales, which before prohibition, made up twenty to thirty percent of its revenue. Given the effect that the Great Depression had at the time, this was a huge factor, along with the potential job market that selling alcohol would open up. It had also become such a regulation nightmare, causing more crime than it was originally intended to help prevent. The same was true for every other country that had some form of prohibition in effect at the time, although the United States was one of the last to repeal. Prohibition was substituted with a different set of regulations on alcohol, many of which are still observed today. For example, a legal drinking age was implemented and most control over alcohol laws shifted back to the states. The laws in states vary from the time and locations from which certain types of alcohol can be purchased to penalties for failure to adhere to laws. In the 1960s Richard Nixon was elected into the presidency of the United States. Because he believed drugs to be a major health concern as well as the key to being able to access certain criminal activity, Nixon and the Bureau of Narcotics and Dangerous Drugs dramatically overstated some drug abuse statistics in order to nip the problem in the bud and start an all out war on drugs. In 1971, Nixon declared drugs to be America's number one enemy and declared the War on Drugs. One of the first policies was the creation of the Drug Enforcement Administration in order to coordinate and streamline all other policies and efforts to be passed. President Ronald Reagan was the next to make the War on Drugs one of his top priorities. In 1986, he signed the Anti-Drug Abuse Act which allocated large sums of money to drug abuse prevention and awareness, and created minimum penalties for drug offenses. Soon thereafter, President George H.W. Bush created the Office of National Drug Control Policy, which aimed to make drug use socially unacceptable and stigmatizing. The War on Drugs has focused primarily on psychoactive drugs. While the War on Drugs seems a noble cause, it has come under much scrutiny over the years for a wide variety of reasons. Some believe many of its policies to be racist based on the types of drugs that are chosen to be focused on, for example, the difference in penalties between crack and powdered cocaine. Others believe that it is simply an infeasible war to be fought, requiring more manpower and equipment around the United States policing drug labs and fields, as well as in other countries where drug crops are primarily grown, and believe these resources would be better spent elsewhere. Many others also believe that the War on Drugs exists solely to be able to suspend rights in order to streamline legal process and have the ability to maintain legitimacy while doing so. Most recently in this discrepancy between the legitimacy and failures of the War on Drugs, marijuana has taken center stage. It is estimated that marijuana started being used for its psychoactive purposes in the early 1900s as a cheap alternative to alcohol. However, in the time surrounding 1937, when marijuana was banned, the attitude surrounding it had become more negative. It was labeled as a narcotic by the federal government and first time offenders would be sentenced to anywhere from five to twenty years. Since the 1960s, movements in favor of marijuana and hemp have been on the rise. Proponents cite many advantages to the plants, including economic, durability and ecological benefits in manufacturing things like textiles, paper, and even gasoline. Advocates also cite many medicinal uses such as the nutritional value the seeds provide and the anti-nauseant and appetite enhancement properties that aid in cancer treatment. It also acts as a muscle relaxant, analgesic, anticonvulsant, anti-asthmatic, and a treatment for glaucoma. However, many opponents argue that many of the medical risks of marijuana outweigh the benefits. They argue that smoking marijuana causes lung damage, cancer, less effective immune systems, can lead to psychological dependency on the substance, and is often the stepping-stone to other addictive drugs. They also argue that there are many viable alternatives that have less harmful effects from smoke and fewer to no psychoactive properties. The use of medicinal marijuana is currently allowed in 14 states, as well as several other North American and European countries. However, in the United States, use of marijuana is still illegal on a federal level. This puts marijuana at the nexus of many different debates occurring in the United States today. It raises the question of which entities should have
the final say in how to treat drug issues, or rather, the question of federalism. It also raises the question of how illegal drugs should be treated in the first place, whether their legality trumps the potential help benefits, and vice versa. 1. B. DEFINITIONS AND RESOLUTIONAL ANALYSIS Overview Since there is no definitive actor provided within the resolution, this will put the terms illegal drugs, public health,and criminal justice into contention. This is because they are all legal terms of art that have very different meanings and ways of being dealt with for every governing entity. The best example of this quandary is with marijuana. It sits on the middle ground between criminal and health under many different levels of government in a wide variety of places. Within the United States alone, there are disparities between many different states and the federal government. Fourteen states currently allow medicinal use of marijuana, but it is still illegal on the federal level. Penalties also differ in severity based on different states, even down to county laws. Because of this, for example, the affirmative can argue that since there are such a wide variety of laws that treat drug abuse criminally, it is an arbitrary standard, and that is public health is a clearer way to treat it. Conversely, the negative can argue that the distinct laws treat it as required based on the abuse specific to their area of jurisdiction. Or, the affirmative can choose to focus on a specific set of laws under a specific government as a case study. Contrarily, the negative can say that the resolution only asks for the desirability of choosing ways to treat illegal drugs in a more generalized form. Abuse Definition: The term drug-abuse is a social, legal and medical construction; legally, the use of any illegal drug could be construed as drug-abuse. Medically, the use of medicines in a non-prescribed manner would be drug-abuse. And socially, using certain drugs that are not accepted by wider society, or using in a fashion that is not condoned by society is drug abuse. Thus, drinking alcohol in moderation in certain settings is not considered drug abuse, while drinking a bottle of spirits a night is; the taking of Valium prescribed by your doctor is drug not abuse, and taking the same pills if given by a friend is. Because of the value-laden nature of the term, many people talk about drug-use rather than abuse. Source: Treatment Now, accessed: 7/2/10, http://www.treatment-now.com/resources/definitions Definition (Drug Abuse): The use of a drug (either licit or illicit) in sufficient quantity and frequency to interfere with a person's ability to make sound life decisions, perform appropriate actions, and fulfill responsibilities with the result that the person is unable to be a law abiding and self-supporting individual. Source: Vermont Department of Corrections: Agency of Human Services, accessed: 7/2/10, http://www.doc.state.vt.us/about/policies/glossary_d Definition (Drug Abuse): The use of illegal drugs or the inappropriate use of legal drugs. The repeated use of drugs to produce pleasure, to alleviate stress, or to alter or avoid reality (or all three). Source: National Institutes of Health and National Institute on Drug Abuse, The Brain: Understanding Neurobiology, accessed: 7/2/10, http://science.education.nih.gov/supplements/nih2/addiction/other/glossary/glossary.htm Discussion: The word abuse in the resolution could have many different meanings. The threshold for abuse of illegal drugs may vary, especially when held in the two different contexts outlined by the resolutionpublic health and criminal justice. For instance, within the realm of public health, abuse could mean once illegal drug use poses a substantive health risk (which has many different valuations in itself) or any misuse. Similarly, for criminal justice, abuse can mean use outside of legal terms, which could include any use since illegal drugs are what is in question by the resolution. However, there are more possibilities because of various legal statutes that define criminal drug use and abuse differently. Controlling the word abuse, as it is the object of the resolution, controls the way that it should be framed as either a criminal or a risky health behavior. Illegal Drugs Definition: Habit forming stimulant or narcotic substance (such as alcohol, cannabis, nicotine, or a derivative of cocoa or poppy) which produces a state of arousal, contentment, or euphoria. Continued or excessive use (called drug abuse or substance abuse) of such substances causes addiction or dependence. Thereafter any attempt to discontinue their use results in specific reactions (called withdrawal symptoms) such as sweating, vomiting, and tremors which cease when the use is resumed. Also called illegal drug where its production and/or use is prohibited. Whether a substance is legal or illegal, however, may have nothing to do with its potential for addiction or harm: alcohol and nicotine, both addictive and harmful, are legal in most countries because they generate substantial employment or government revenue through taxes.
Source: Business Dictionary, accessed 7/11/10, http://www.businessdictionary.com/definition/drug.html Discussion: Since the resolution doesn't specify which illegal drugs should be viewed as either a public health or criminal justice issue, it might be difficult to decide which should be included in an affirmative or negative case, and which way they should be treated. For example, the affirmative could specify certain drugs that mandate that illegal drug abuse be viewed as a public health concern, such as with intravenous drugs since they care such a high risk of HIV/AIDS and other blood diseases, and that viewing these certain drugs in that context outweighs any criminal activities that may follow. Conversely, the negative may argue that since the resolution calls for illegal drugs in their generalized form, that the affirmative must defend all illegal drugs under the frame of public health. Ought Definition: Used to indicate obligation or duty. Source: The American Heritage Dictionary, 2000, accessed: 7/3/10, http://www.thefreedictionary.com/ought Definition: Used to indicate advisability or prudence. Source: The American Heritage Dictionary, 2000, accessed: 7/3/10, http://www.thefreedictionary.com/ought Definition: Used to indicate desirability. Source: The American Heritage Dictionary, 2000, accessed: 7/3/10, http://www.thefreedictionary.com/ought Definition: Used to indicate probability. Source: The American Heritage Dictionary, 2000, accessed: 7/3/10, http://www.thefreedictionary.com/ought Discussion: This word will often imply a moral obligation to view the abuse of illegal drugs as either a public health or a criminal justice issue. In order to prove whether this moral obligation exists, both sides must go beyond the simple advantages and disadvantages of public health versus criminal justice. Since the resolution assumes governing entities, as explained in the overview, the moral obligations of different governing entities may differ. The moral obligations that should be investigated for the cases should be based in whichever government is chosen or not chosen. For example, on the affirmative,it can be argued that governments have a moral obligation to protect the welfare and health of its citizens. On the other hand, the negative can argue that governments have a duty to ensure that laws are followed. Public Health Definition: Discusses and acts on issues that affect the general health of a community. Often involves issues such as water safety, sanitation, immunizations, housing, infectious diseases and illness prevention. Source: Southcentral Foundation, accessed: 7/2/10, http://www.scf.cc/research/glossary.ak Definition: One of the efforts organised by society to protect, promote, and restore the people's health. It is the combination of sciences, skills, and beliefs that are directed to the maintenance and improvement of the health of all the people through collective or social actions. The programs, services, and institutions involved emphasise the prevention of disease and the health needs of the population as a whole. Public health activities change with changing technology and social values, but the goals remain the same: to reduce the amount of disease, premature death, and disease-produced discomfort and disability in the population. Public health is thus a social institution, a discipline, and a practice. Source: Australia's Health, 1996, accessed: 7/2/10, http://www.aihw.gov.au/publications/aus/ah96/ah96-x04.html Discussion: Since public health can be defined and operates in a few different ways, it is important to find the part of it that best fits the purposes of the case being made. It is a term with goals that are in constant flux. Therefore, the negative can argue that public health is more of an arbitrary standard to evaluate the legality than that of criminal justice which has set, specific procedures with which to handle issues. Criminal Justice Definition: The system of law enforcement, the bar, the judiciary, corrections, and probation that is directly involved in the apprehension, prosecution, defense, sentencing, incarceration, and supervision of those suspected of or charged with criminal offenses. Source: The American Heritage Dictionary, accessed: 7/10/10, http://www.answers.com/topic/criminal-justice
Definition: It is a term used for the series of steps involved in proving any criminal activity like gathering evidences, arresting the accused, conducting trials, making defense, pronouncing judgement after the crime is proved, carrying out punishment. Source: Legal Explanations, accessed: 7/10/10, http://www.legal-explanations.com/definitions/criminal-justice.htm Discussion: The punishments doled out for illegal drug abuse are different for each governing entity. Therefore, for the affirmative to be able to specify reasons why illegal drugs should not be evaluated as a criminal justice issue on the whole they will have to prove reasons why certain penal codes are too strict and how certain criminalization policies may worsen the problem. On the other hand, the negative can argue that the resolution calls for the generalized wholesale rejection of all laws in the criminal justice system as a way to treat illegal drug abuse, and that not all instances of this are good. 1. C. TOPIC STRATEGIES AFFIRMATIVE ADDICTION IS INVOLUNTARY More often than not, abuse of illegal drugs is an involuntary reaction to the drugs. Even though most addicts do not wish to be under the control of substance, there is an intense bodily and psychological desire to use it anyways. Failure to do so results in withdrawal symptoms, many of which can make the person physically ill. For those that willingly took drugs and became addicted, even though they have initial blame, the addiction that follows is not something that is easily helped. One can't choose to simply get rid of this part of themselves. Addiction is considered a disease, and therefore should be a health issue. Also, people should not be punished for having abused illegal drugs, just for illegal actions surrounding it. Another issue is that some people were introduced to drugs against their own will and compulsively use them at very little fault of their own. In this category are people forced to take them, such as infants, rape victims, and ever people with prescription medications. Treating the issue of drug abuse as an issue of public health is a more subjective system that takes these people into account rather than that of its more objective counterpart of criminal justice. FEDERALISM Marijuana provides the case study for discrepancies between state and federal law in the United States. Whereas many states are starting to treat marijuana as a prescription medication, there are still raids on the companies by the Drug Enforcement Agency. Federalism is a driving force that keeps the powerful from becoming too powerful and prevents abuses of power. Federalism also allows for specific states to be able to be reflexive in their own laws which best suit the situation under their particular jurisdiction. NEGATIVE THE ABUSE OF ILLEGAL DRUGS AS BOTH PUBLIC HEALTH AND CRIMINAL JUSTICE While the affirmative is locked into defending that public health is a good way to treat illegal drug abuse, and that criminal justice is not, the exact inverse is not necessarily true for the negative. In this sense, the traditional burdens of the affirmative and negative may be reversed. Where the negative may usually have to prove itself exclusive with the affirmative, it is placed into a situation where it may find itself wanting to incorporate the entirety of the affirmative's case. All that has to be done to accomplish this is to prove that illegal drug abuse is not solely a public health issue. Criminal justice and public health often overlap. If this is the case, the negative must provide a disadvantage to solely treating illegal drugs as a public health issue. The possibilities for this disadvantage are endless. An example, however, are that the affirmative ignores an entire group of people who exhibit abusive drug behavior, such as the majority of the imprisoned community. However, also given the resolution, the negative does not have to defend either public health or criminal justice as an option. BIOPOWER Biopower is the concern for life addressed by politics. In this particular case, it deals with the quality of life in a few different ways. First is the stigmatization of illegal drug abuse. The illegal drug abuser is often stigmatized in this process. They are seen as a cancer to society that needs to be cut out, for the good of the public health. Next is how benign it
appears to have a benevolent reason to either punish or extend the hand of health to the illegal drug abuser. It appears to be for the good of the individual in the context of the general population, for their health, for harm reduction, while simultaneously stigmatizing that portion of the population.
SECTION 2. RESEARCH GUIDE

2. A. BIBLIOGRAPHY FOR ESSAYS National Institute of Drug Abuse, Treating Offenders with Drug Problems: Integrating Public Health and Public Safety, National Institutes of Health, March 2009, accessed 7/10/10 http://www.nida.nih.gov/tib/drugs_crime.html This article provides an investigation into possible treatment routes for drug abuse in order to help both the safety the health of the community. Montague, Arthur, Canadian Writer, The Opium War, 1839-1842, Essortment, 2002, accessed: 7/10/10, http://www.essortment.com/all/opiumwarchina_rnvr.htm In this essay, Montague describes the first war on drugs in history, the Opium War, fought between Britain and between 1839 and 1842. China and
The National Alliance of Advocates for Buprenorphine Treatment, A History of Opiate opoid Laws in the United States, 4/20/2010, accessed: 7/10/10, http://www.naabt.org/laws.cfm Here the National Alliance of Advocates for Buprenorphine Treatment put together a comprehensive history of laws within the United States. opiate
Lawrence Schrad, Mark, Department of Political Science at Villanova University, Constitutional Blemishes: American Alcohol Prohibition and Repeal as Policy Punctuation, Policy Studies Journal, 35.3, 2007. In this essay, Lawrence Schrad attempts to fill in the gaps of what he believes were the causes of the enactment and repeal of the prohibition of alcohol in the United States. Spillane, Joseph is Associate Professor of History at the University of Floriday, Did Drug Prohibition Work?: Reflections on the End of the First Cocaine Experience in the United States, 1910-45, Journal of Drug Issues, 28.2, 1998. This essay tracks use patterns of cocaine in the United States, mainly in the first half of the twentieth century in to predict when the next fall in the pattern will happen. order
NPR, Timeline: America's War on Drugs, April 2, 2007, accessed: 7/10/10, http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php storyId=9252490 NPR provides a comprehensive timeline with analysis pulled from their Frontline series on the War on Drugs in America. Miranda, Joseph is former instructor at the U.S. Army JFK Special Warfare Center and editor of Strategy and Tactics magazine, War or Pseudo-War? Social Justice, 25.2, 1998. Miranda attempts to demonstrate reasons why the War on Drugs is and isn't working. While providing real-world examples based in projections made and empirical failures surrounding those projections, Miranda also provides the constructs surrounding the war that allow its continued existence.
Sussman, Steve is a drug-abuse researcher and professor at USC, Stacy , Alan W. is Professor and Associate Dean for Faculty Affairs at Claremont University, Dent, Clyde W. is Senior Research Scientist at the Oregon Public Health Division, Simon, Thomas R. is with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Johnson, C. Anderson is Professor and Dean of the School of Community and Global Health at Claremont University, Marijuana Use: Current Issues and New Research Directions, Journal of Drug Issues, 26.4, 1996. This article explores the history of marijuana in the United States and gives very detailed explanations of the properties of the substance. It aims to find a new way to research the effects, beneficial or not, and apply that to the way that marijuana is treated in the United States. O'Keefe, Karen is Director of State Policies for Marijuana Policy Project, 14 Legal Medical Marijuana States, ProCon, 6/24/2010, accessed: 7/10/10, http://medicalmarijuana.procon.org/view.resource.php?resourceID=000881 This is a frequently updated list of states that allow medicinal use of marijuana that includes summaries of the provisions in the laws allowing them as well as the laws themselves. Morse, Stephen J. is Ferdinand Wakeman Hubbell Professor of Law and Professor of Psychology and Law in Psychiatry at the University of Pennsylvania, Addiction, Genetics and Criminal Responsibility, Law and Contemporary Problems, 69.1-2, 2006. In this article Morse explores accounts of criminal responsibility in order to understand other variables that come play with it, such as drug addiction. 2. B. BIBLIOGRAPHY FOR FURTHER RESEARCH Schrag, Peter is a retired editorial page editor and columnist for the Sacramento Bee and has been writing for The Nation for nearly a half-century , A Quagmire for Our Time: the War on Drugs, Journal of Public Health Policy, 23.3, 2002. In this article, Schrag explores the reasons why the War on Drugs is failing, and why the general public and many states are rebelling against the federal government on the issue of drugs. Misner, Robert L. is a professor of law, director of the Center for Religion, Law and Democracy at Willamette University,, A Strategy for Mercy, William and Mary Law Review, 41.4, 2000. This essay investigates and tracks the value shifts in the American public as well as the criminal justice system, and the effects this has on the country as a whole, including the abuse of illegal drugs. Campbell, Nancy D. is a professor of science and technology studies at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, The Construction of Pregnant Drug-Using Women as Criminal Perpetrators, Fordham Urban Law Journal, 33.2, 2006. This article takes a specific sect of the illegal drug-abusing community, pregnant women, and explores whether or not this group of people should be treated criminally or through public health initiatives. Kay, Amanda, The Agony of Ecstasy: Reconsidering the Punitive Approach to United States Drug Policy, Fordham Urban Law Journal, 29.5, 2002. Kay tries to make sense of the current cost-benefit analysis that current drug policy employs by examining the effects that this system has had on the United states and explores the merits behind prohibition and harm reduction. She places this in the context of what it means for punitive actions taken against drug users. into
OHear, Michael M. is Associate Dean for Research and Professor of Law at Marquette University, Federalism and Drug Control, Vanderbilt Law Review, 57.3, 2004. This article explores the questions of: which level of government-federal, state, or local-ought to have primacy in making and enforcing drug control policy? Which should have the authority to choose whether punishment or treatment of drug users will be emphasized in a particular locale? And what role should the other levels of government play in implementing such a choice? Bullington, Bruce is Associate Professor of the College of Criminology and Criminal Justice at Florida State University, Drug Policy Reform and Its Detractors: the United States as the Elephant in the Closet, Journal of Drug Issues, 34.3, 2004. This article concerns the United States' role in international drug policy making, past and present. In doing so, it investigates the models of prohibition versus the models of harm reduction. Armstrong, Andrew, Drug Courts and the De Facto Legalization of Drug Use for Participants in Residential Treatment Facilities, Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology, 94.1, 2004. Armstrong explores the ways in which illegal drugs become legal under certain circumstances, citing specifically residential treatment facilities as a case study. Pollack, Harold is the Helen Ross Professor at the School of Social Service Administration and faculty chair of the Center for Health Administration Studies at the University of Chicago, The Moral, Prudential and Political Arguments about Harm Reduction, Contemporary Drug Problems, 35.2-3, 2008. This article attempts to answer the questions: Why is the United States so resistant to public health strategies that find wide acceptance in many other wealthy democracies? This old question remains pressing. More important, given our history of missed opportunities to reduce the harms connected with HIV/ AIDS, can we do better? Gottschalk, Marie is a professor of political science at Yale University, Dismantling the Carceral State: the Future of Penal Policy Reform, Texas Law Review, 84.7, 2006. This article explores what Gottschalk believes are the proper ways to handle drug abuse within the criminal justice system.
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AFFIRMATIVE SAMPLE CASE

I stand in affirmation of the resolution Resolved: The abuse of illegal drugs ought to be treated as a matter of public health, not of criminal justice. IMPORTANT DEFINTIONS: ABUSE, FROM THE VERMONT DEPARTMENT OF CORRECTIONS The use of a drug (either licit or illicit) in sufficient quantity and frequency to interfere with a person's ability to make sound life decisions, perform appropriate actions, and fulfill responsibilities with the result that the person is unable to be a law abiding and self-supporting individual. VALUE: SOCIAL WELFARE Australians and Natural Resource Management, Australian Government, March 2002, accessed 7/13/10, http://www.anra.gov.au/topics/economics/pubs/national/anrm-report/glossary.html Social welfare can be considered to be the well-being of the community as a whole. In this report the term is used with reference to results derived from a non-market valuation of environmental resources. The welfare impacts of a policy that affects those non-market values can be considered the impacts to societys overall well-being. CRITERION: HARM REDUCTION Drislane, Robert is a professor of sociology at Thompson Rivers University, and Parkinson, Gary, Ph.D, Online Dictionary of the Social Sciences, Athabasca University, accessed 7/13/10, http://bitbucket.icaap.org/dict.pl?alpha=H A term often used in the discussion of drug users, prostitutes, etc. Rather than taking a moralistic approach, perhaps focusing on punishment or rehabilitation, the system tries to reduce the harm that comes to such offenders. For example, provide drug users with clean needles, or perhaps with a safe place to shoot-up, or even to provide them with standardized heroin. Or the community could provide a safe area for prostitutes to work, provide free testing for infectious diseases, etc. All of this will reduce harm to the offenders but in the long-term should also reduce harm to the community. CONTENTION ONE: TREATING DRUG ABUSE AS CRIMINAL JUSTICE INCREASES HEALTH RISKS AND DEATH A - THE CRIMINAL JUSTICE SYSTEM ENFORCES AN ABSTINENCE ONLY APPROACH TO DRUG ABUSE, DENYING THOSE THAT STRUGGLE WITH ADDICTION SAFE ALTERNATIVES Macmaster, Samuel A. is Associate Professor of College of Social Work at University of Tennessee Knoxville, Harm Reduction: A New Perspective on Substance Abuse Services, Social Work, 49.3, 2004. Abstinence may not be a practical approach for all substance users. The literature on abstinence-based substance abuse treatment suggests that most service users do not abstain and often do not complete programs (Booth, Crowley, & Zhang, 1996; Higgins et al., 1993; Kang et al., 1991). Research also suggests that substance users are more likely to use "low threshold" programs where admissions criteria are relaxed, few initial demands are made on service users, and punitive sanctions are not placed on continued substance use (Ward, Darke, Hall, & Mattick, 1992). Also, abstinence-based substance abuse services are not accessible to everyone because of financial and other constraints (Hay Group, 1998; Wenger & Rosenbaum, 1994). Of particular importance to the present discussion, the abstinence orientation views individuals who are not immediately interested in complete abstinence as resistant or unservable (Miller & Rollnick, 1991). The failure to provide services to substance users who do not have an interest in abstinence is at least in part related to the concept of enabling, which posits that family members and friends often allow or facilitate substance use (Miller & Millman, 1989; Murphy, 1984; Thomas, Yoshioka, & Ager, 1996). In the enabling concept, any intervention or program that stops short of requiring abstinence is not likely to be effective and may facilitate or enable substance use. The result is a mutually exclusive choice between abstinence-oriented interventions and all other services.
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B THOSE STRUGGLING MAINTAIN UNSAFE HABITS, PUTTING THEM AND OTHERS AT RISK FOR DISEASES SUCH AS HIV/AIDS BBC News, Dirty Needles Blamed for HIV, May 6, 2003, accessed: 7/13/10, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/2995779.stm Children in South Africa are being infected with HIV through dirty needles, experts have claimed. Researchers have suggested hundreds of thousands of children may have contracted the virus in this way. The study is the latest to point to contaminated needles as a major cause of HIV in Africa. Some researchers believe as many as 40% of HIV infections in African adults are linked to injections. CONTENTION TWO: HARM REDUCTION SOLVES A - HARM REDUCTION USES A REALISTIC APPROACH TO THE NATURE OF DRUG ABUSE Macmaster, Samuel A. is Associate Professor of College of Social Work at University of Tennessee Knoxville, Harm Reduction: A New Perspective on Substance Abuse Services, Social Work, 49.3, 2004. Harm reduction is a conceptual framework that provides for individuals willing to be engaged in services, but not immediately seeking abstinence. Based on a public health model of social problems, harm reduction seeks to eliminate the negative consequences of phenomena for the members of a society without necessarily eliminating the phenomena (Des Jarlais, 1995). Primarily viewed as a policy framework, it is not synonymous with legalization, although the two are often confused (United Nations International Drug Control Programme [UNIDCP], 1997). Practitioners using this perspective develop interventions that reduce drug-related harm without necessarily promoting abstinence as the only solution. Common to discussions of harm reduction (Des Jarlais; Drucker, 1995; Harm Reduction Coalition, 1996; Scavuzzo, 1996; Springer, 1991, 1996; van Laar, de Zwart, & Mensink, 1996) are five assumptions: 1. Substance use has and will be part of our world; accepting this reality leads to a focus on reducing drug-related harm rather than reducing drug use. 2. Abstinence from substances is clearly effective at reducing substance-related harm, but it is only one of many possible objectives of services to substance users. 3. Substance use inherently causes harm; however, many of the most harmful consequences of substance use (HIV/AIDS, hepatitis C, overdoses, automobile accidents, and so forth) can be eliminated without complete abstinence. 4. Services to substance users must be relevant and user friendly if they are to be effective in helping people minimize their substance-related harm. 5. Substance use must be understood from a broad perspective and not solely as an individual act; accepting this idea moves interventions from coercion and criminal justice solutions to a public health or social work perspective. B - HARM REDUCTION RECOGNIZES THAT THE RISK OF DISEASE OUTWEIGHS THE RISK OF SUBSTANCE ABUSE AND IS THE ONLY PROGRAM THAT ADDRESSES THAT Macmaster, Samuel A. is Associate Professor of College of Social Work at University of Tennessee Knoxville, Harm Reduction: A New Perspective on Substance Abuse Services, Social Work, 49.3, 2004. A recent development is the rapid adoption of harm reduction among HIV/AIDS services providers in the United States in response to the association between HW/AIDS risk and injection drug use (Clapp & Burke, 1999). In this context, HIV/ AIDS prevention took priority over preventing substance use. The preventable harm caused by HIV/AIDS clearly outweighs the need to adhere to the abstinence-based perspective. Quite simply, "dead addicts don't recover" (Vail & Stokes, 1999).
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AFFIRMATIVE EVIDENCE EXTENSIONS

PUBLIC HEALTH SOLVES CRIMINAL ABUSES
1. TREATING DRUG ABUSE AS A CRIMINAL ISSUE LEADS TO ABUSE OF THE LEGAL SYSTEM Takahashi, Saul, was employed until March 2009 at the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, as Drug Control Officer in the Convention Evaluation Section of the International Narcotics Control Board Secretariat, Drug Control, Human Rights, and the Right to the Highest Attainable Standard of Health: By No Means Straightforward Issues, Human Rights Quarterly, 31.3, August 2009. There have been a number of reports in recent months regarding human rights as it relates to drug control that raise issue with international efforts against drug abuse and illicit drug trafficking. The Beckley Foundation, for example, in a joint paper with the International Harm Reduction Association, Human Rights Watch, and the Canadian HIV/AIDS Legal Network, raises concerns regarding the conduct of law enforcement officials in several countries towards drug abusers: People who use drugs make especially easy targets for arrest or ill-treatment by police needing to fulfill arrest quotas, as Human Rights Watch has documented in reports on Russia, Kazakhstan, and Ukraine. . . . Police also use drug addiction as a tool to coerce incriminating testimony from drug users. A former senior detective specializing in drug enforcement cases, and attorneys and social workers to drug users in Ukraine have reported, for example, that police intentionally use withdrawal as an investigative tool to coerce incriminating testimony from drug users, extort money from drug users by threatening to detain them, forcing them to suffer withdrawal and deny medical assistance to drug users. 2. TREATING DRUG ABUSE AS CRIMINAL LEADS TO HUMAN RIGHTS VIOLATIONS Takahashi, Saul, was employed until March 2009 at the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, as Drug Control Officer in the Convention Evaluation Section of the International Narcotics Control Board Secretariat, Drug Control, Human Rights, and the Right to the Highest Attainable Standard of Health: By No Means Straightforward Issues, Human Rights Quarterly, 31.3, August 2009. Academics have also made similar points. Tom Obokata, for example, has examined numerous issues related to drug control and human rights, including the death penalty and human rights violations in the course of law enforcement operations against drug traffickers and abusers. He rightly notes that law enforcement practices against traffickers and narcotics users also raise a series of human rights concerns. Instances of physical and verbal abuse during search, seizure, and arrest of those suspected of narcotics related offences have been reported. The war on drugs in some parts of the world also has resulted in the extrajudicial killing not only of traffickers, but also of innocent civilians. 3. DRUG ABUSE SHOULD BE PREVENTED BEFORE IT REACHES THE CRIMINAL JUSTICE SYSTEM, WHICH IS ONLY POSSIBLE THROUGH TREATING IT AS A MATTER OF PUBLIC HEALTH Autry, Joseph is Acting Deputy Administrator of Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, Testimony on Oversight of Agency Efforts to Prevent and Treat Drug Abuse, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, March 18, 1999, accessed: 7/16/10, http://www.hhs.gov/asl/testify/t990318c.html The relationship between crime and drugs and the cost of drugs and crime to our country is clear. More than 1.7 million people are behind bars in America at an annual cost to the taxpayer of $38 billion. Seventy percent or 1.2 million of them have histories of drug and alcohol abuse and addiction. For hundreds of thousands of these individuals drug abuse and addiction is the core problem that prompted their criminal activity. Our prison and punishment approach to substance abuse is not sufficient by itself. Instead we need to approach drug abuse as a public health issue and invest our resources in reaching adults, adolescents, and children in need of substance abuse prevention and treatment services before they reach the criminal justice system.
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ILLEGAL DRUGS CAUSE HEALTH CONCERNS AND DEATH

1. INTRAVENOUS DISEASES MAKE DRUG ABUSE A PUBLIC HEALTH CONCERN Haden, Mark works for Vancouver Coastal Health, Illicit IV Drugs: a Public Health Approach, Canadian Journal of Public Health, 93.6, 2002. Historically, substance abuse services have had "abstinence" as the dominant goal and as a result of this focus, programs for individuals who currently use drugs have not been well represented in the service spectrum. The HIV/AIDS and Hepatitis C epidemics among intravenous drug users have led to the discussion of new public health "harm reduction" service principles which begin to address the specific needs of this drug using population. 2. DRUG ENFORCEMENT LEADS TO GREATER HEALTH HARMS AND DEATH TO USERS SINCE THEIR USE IS UNREGULATED Shepard, Edward is Associate Professor and Chair of the Department of Economics at LeMoyne College, and Blackley, Paul R. is a Professor in the Department of Economics at LeMoyne College, U.S. Drug Control Policies: Federal Spending on Law Enforcement versus Treatment in Public Health Outcomes, Journal of Drug Issues, 34.4, 2004. An increasing number of scholars from the social science and scientific/medical fields argue that law enforcement approaches may serve to aggravate the public health costs associated with illicit drug use. Miron and Zwiebel (1995, p. 179) noted, "Another effect of prohibition is increased uncertainty about product quality," and concluded "accidental poisonings and overdoses will occur more frequently in a prohibited market." Friedman (1998, p. 210) argued that drug prohibition leads to "compounding harm to users" because of the uncertain quality of drugs and behaviors such as needle sharing that spread diseases. Nadelmann (1988, p. 12) suggested that successful drug enforcement operations might increase the health costs associated with illicit drug use because the disruption of supply networks leads the drug user to "seek out new and hence less reliable suppliers; the result is that more, not fewer, drug-related emergencies and deaths occur." MacCoun and Reuter (2001) provided an extensive review of the evidence from the social sciences and identified several ways in which drug prohibition and enforcement activities can lead to adverse public health consequences. They include transmission of HIV and other diseases, poor quality control, inhibition of voluntary pursuit of treatment, and restrictions on medical uses. Lastly, recent research has found that increases in drug enforcement are associated with higher rates of violent crime (Rasmussen, Benson, & Sollars, 1993; Resignato, 2000) Drucker (1999, p. 25) evaluated historical data on enforcement, arrests, drug related emergency room visits and drug-related deaths and concluded that "drug law enforcement can also be viewed as an independent variable - a causal factor responsible for worsening many of the social and public health problems that we normally attribute to drug use per se." He noted that during the 1980s and 1990s when law enforcement resources for drug control increased substantially, overdose deaths and emergency room visits also increased, suggesting that current approaches were not successful in this area. Drug enforcement and arrests were disproportionately concentrated in urban areas with large minority populations, and this is where public health costs associated with illicit drug use increased the most. Drucker (p. 15) maintained that law enforcement approaches to enforcing drug prohibition served to "criminalize and marginalize drug users and increase drug-related risks to life and health." These individuals are more likely to suffer the severe health consequences associated with drug use, abuse, or addiction. Duncan (1994) analyzed the statistical relationship between drug law enforcement expenditures and drug-related deaths and reached similar conclusions. He found that drug-induced deaths are positively associated with drug enforcement expenditures and concluded that the evidence "does not support the view that the enforcement of drug laws protects the public health" (Duncan, p. 226).
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TREATMENT AND AVOIDING DEATH RATES ARE MOST IMPORTANT

1. TREATMENT LEADS TO DECREASE IN MORTALITY RATES WHILE ENFORCEMENT INCREASES THEM Shepard, Edward is Associate Professor and Chair of the Department of Economics at LeMoyne College, and Blackley, Paul R. is a Professor in the Department of Economics at LeMoyne College, U.S. Drug Control Policies: Federal Spending on Law Enforcement versus Treatment in Public Health Outcomes, Journal of Drug Issues, 34.4, 2004. Consistent with prior studies, increased expenditures on treatment are associated with fewer drug-induced deaths in the long run. Higher expenditures on enforcement activities, however, are found to have a positive association with mortality rates. These results provide evidence in support of hypotheses advanced by Friedman (1998), Nadelmann (1988), and Drucker (1999) that drug prohibition and related enforcement activities are associated with significant increases in the public health costs of illicit drug use. Enforcement activities are also found to have larger adverse effects on the Black population, whether outcomes are measured as the number of deaths or as age-adjusted mortality rates. Given the small sample size used for this aggregate study, these results should be interpreted cautiously, and further research in this area is needed. Larger samples may allow for integrating additional variables such as drug use into the model or for separating LAW into its domestic and interdiction components and TREAT into its education and treatment components. But the results from this time series analysis raise serious questions about the possible harmful impacts on public health from the current mix of anti-drug policies. The long-run elasticities provide a basis for estimating potential benefits from changing the current policy mix away from enforcement and interdiction and towards education and treatment. Applying the estimated coefficients, a 10 percent reduction in expenditures on enforcement (about 1 billion dollars by the late 1990s) would be associated with a long-run reduction of over 20% in both the number of deaths and the age-adjusted death rate. This would imply that close to 3,000 deaths a year might be avoided with a shift away from enforcement approaches to drug control. Adding the billion dollars to education and treatment would represent an 18% increase in 1998. The estimated elasticity of 1.59 implies a reduction of close to 5,000 drug-induced deaths per year as a result. Thus, the underlying estimates suggest that very substantial improvements in public health may be achieved by emphasizing education and treatment over enforcement and interdiction. It is obvious that estimates of these effects must be repeated over time as additional evidence and larger sample sizes become available. Further research is in the public's interest in order to ensure a rational use of scarce resources in this area of government activity. 2. DEATH STATISTICS ARE THE MOST RELIABLE WHEN MEASURING PUBLIC HEALTH OUTCOMES. EVALUATE AFF IMPACTS FIRST. Shepard, Edward is Associate Professor and Chair of the Department of Economics at LeMoyne College, and Blackley, Paul R. is a Professor in the Department of Economics at LeMoyne College, U.S. Drug Control Policies: Federal Spending on Law Enforcement versus Treatment in Public Health Outcomes, Journal of Drug Issues, 34.4, 2004. According to Duncan (1988, p. 226), mortality data are "among the most complete and reliable data by which the public health can be measured" (see also Ferrara, 1980). It is therefore assumed that deaths associated with drug use are an effective indicator of the public health consequences of U.S. drug policy. There is also evidence that drug enforcement is heavily concentrated in urban areas with large minority populations. Drucker (1999) found that the public health consequences of enforcement activities are disproportionately felt in minority populations, and so the model is estimated for the total population and separately for White and Black populations. The number of deaths and age-adjusted mortality rates due to drug use as published by the Centers for Disease Control (CDC, 2000) were used as the variables to measure public health outcomes. Policy categories used to measure federal resources devoted to drug control activities include expenditures on interdiction, law enforcement, education, and treatment for the years 1981 to 1998. The sample size is relatively small and limits the scope of models and number of factors that can be assessed. Consistent aggregate data prior to 1981 or individual state data that would allow for pooled estimation is not currently available. The data used below represent federal resources and do not include state and local expenditures. However, since much of drug law enforcement involves the coordination of federal, state, and local resources, changes at the state and local level are likely to have effects similar to those at the federal level.
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PUBLIC HEALTH COSTS LESS THAN CRIMINAL JUSTICE

1. CRIMINAL PROSECUTION FOR DRUGS IS EXTRAORDINARILY EXPENSIVE Shepard, Edward is Associate Professor and Chair of the Department of Economics at LeMoyne College, and Blackley, Paul R. is a Professor in the Department of Economics at LeMoyne College, U.S. Drug Control Policies: Federal Spending on Law Enforcement versus Treatment in Public Health Outcomes, Journal of Drug Issues, 34.4, 2004. By any measure, there have been dramatic increases in public resources devoted to drug control - increases in criminal justice system expenditures for arrests, incarceration, and interdiction as well as resources devoted to education and treatment. Over the past two decades, federal spending on enforcement of the drug laws has increased more than tenfold, with total federal, state, and local spending on control of illegal drugs now estimated to exceed $30 billion each year (National Research Council [NRC], 2001). The United States has over two million prisoners and one of the highest incarceration rates in the world, driven in part by enforcement of drug laws by all levels of government (U.S. Department of Justice [DOJ], 2002a). Since 1980, the number of individuals incarcerated for drug-related offenses in state prisons has also increased more than tenfold (NRC, 2001). In 2001, there were over 1.5 million arrests for illegal drugs, a majority for possession as opposed to sales or manufacture (DOJ, 2002b). The economic costs associated with the current "drug war" have increased dramatically and underscore the need for further study of the effectiveness of the current approach and its emphasis on enforcement. 2. ILLEGAL DRUG ABUSE SHOULD BE VIEWED AS A PUBLIC HEALTH ISSUE TO REDUCE HEALTH COSTS Shepard, Edward is Associate Professor and Chair of the Department of Economics at LeMoyne College, and Blackley, Paul R. is a Professor in the Department of Economics at LeMoyne College, U.S. Drug Control Policies: Federal Spending on Law Enforcement versus Treatment in Public Health Outcomes, Journal of Drug Issues, 34.4, 2004. The public health consequences of our nation's drug control efforts are an important area of research with significant public policy implications. One of the goals of U.S. policy is to reduce use and abuse of illegal drugs and thereby lower the associated health costs of sickness and disease, emergency room visits, and overdoses. However, over the same time period that expenditures on enforcement have escalated, overdose deaths and emergency room visits associated with illicit drugs have increased significantly. A review of the literature by Mast, Benson, and Rasmussen (2000) identified significant unintended consequences from policy actions. They cited studies that demonstrate a positive association between increases in resources devoted to enforcement and higher rates of both property and violent crime over time and across geographical areas. Similarly, some researchers (Drucker, 1999; Nadelmann, 1988) have argued that strict enforcement policies serve to exacerbate the public health problems of illicit drug use by marginalizing the drug user and rendering uncertain the quality and potency of any drugs taken. The causal relationships underlying these trends are uncertain. Further analysis of the longrun relationship between alternative drug control policies and important outcomes such as the public health may therefore make an important contribution to the current public policy debate. 3. TREATING DRUG ABUSE AS A CRIMINAL ISSUE DIVERTS RESOURCES FROM EDUCATION, SOCIAL SERVICES, AND PUBLIC HEALTH MEANS NEGATIVE EFFECTS ON CRIME RATES AND MORE DEATHS. Shepard, Edward is Associate Professor and Chair of the Department of Economics at LeMoyne College, and Blackley, Paul R. is a Professor in the Department of Economics at LeMoyne College, U.S. Drug Control Policies: Federal Spending on Law Enforcement versus Treatment in Public Health Outcomes, Journal of Drug Issues, 34.4, 2004. In contrast, those who favor alternative approaches (e.g., legal, regulated markets for currently illicit drugs or an emphasis on education and treatment over interdiction and prohibition enforcement) believe that the net benefits of different approaches are greater than those for current policy. Current costs include increases in the use of criminal justice system resources for investigations, arrests, interdiction, and incarceration and the diversion of resources away from other uses including education and social programs as well as addressing other types of crime. Also relevant are the forgone tax revenues from regulated markets as well as unintended adverse effects on crime rates, public health, and economic productivity due to stricter enforcement. Several researchers, including Drucker (1999) and Duncan (1994), have evaluated evidence with regard to drug law enforcement and public health outcomes and found that enforcement may be exacerbating the negative public health consequences of illicit drag use as reflected by increases in emergency room visits and overdose deaths. Although this paper focuses on the public health effects of alternative drug control policies, it is important to note that the impacts mentioned above would also have to be quantified for a more comprehensive assessment.
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DRUG ABUSE IS EMPIRICALLY A PUBLIC HEALTH ISSUE

1. DRUG ABUSE IS MORE A HEALTH THAN CRIMINAL ISSUE Takahashi, Saul, was employed until March 2009 at the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, as Drug Control Officer in the Convention Evaluation Section of the International Narcotics Control Board Secretariat, Drug Control, Human Rights, and the Right to the Highest Attainable Standard of Health: By No Means Straightforward Issues, Human Rights Quarterly, 31.3, August 2009. The right to the highest attainable standard of health is an even more salient issue in drug control than the issue of criminal justice and the death penalty. Article 12 of the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR) states that United States Parties to the present Covenant recognize the right of everyone to the enjoyment of the highest attainable standard of physical and mental health,and, as shall be examined, this article has been cited to justify various approaches in drug control often categorized as harm reduction. There is no single, internationally agreed upon definition of the term harm reduction. Broadly speaking, the term signifies measures taken to reduce the harm caused by the abuse of drugs, as opposed to measures aimed at eliminating the abuse itself. For example, the distribution of clean needles to drug addicts usually referred to as needle exchange is one of the main harm reduction measures. In the late 1980s, governments became aware that HIV was being spread through the sharing of needles amongst drug (mainly heroin) addicts. Countries therefore introduced programs whereby drug addicts could exchange dirty needles for, or receive free of charge, clean needles, so as to prevent the sharing of infected needles. Even in countries where drug abuse or possession is criminalized, governments took measures to ensure that addicts who received these needles were not prosecuted so that the addicts would not be discouraged from using the service. 2. DRUG ABUSE HAS BEEN LEGALLY DETERMINED AS A HEALTH CARE ISSUE IN CANADA Takahashi, Saul, was employed until March 2009 at the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, as Drug Control Officer in the Convention Evaluation Section of the International Narcotics Control Board Secretariat, Drug Control, Human Rights, and the Right to the Highest Attainable Standard of Health: By No Means Straightforward Issues, Human Rights Quarterly, 31.3, August 2009. At the domestic level, a recent judgment of the Supreme Court of British Columbia, Canada, also touches on these issues. The operators of the sole injection room in Canada, known as Insite, which had been established initially as a pilot project under an exemption from federal law prohibiting the possession of illicit drugs, sued for relief from the federal government? efforts to terminate the exemption and consequently, close down the site. The court found in favor of the plaintiffs, stating: While users do not use Insite to directly treat their addiction, they receive services and assistance at Insite which reduce the risk of overdose that is a feature of their illness, they avoid the risk of being infected or of infecting others by injection, and they gain access to counselling and consultation that may lead to abstinence and rehabilitation. All of this is health care. . . . failure to manage the addiction in all of its aspects may lead to death, whether from overdose or other illness resulting from unsafe injection practices. If the root cause of death derives from the illness of addiction, then a law that prevents access to health care services that can prevent death clearly engages the right to life. . . . Denial of access to Insite and safe injection . . . amounts to a condemnation of the consumption that led to addiction in the first place, while ignoring the resulting illness. Though not a ruling on the right to health as such, it is clearly relevant for the matter at hand. The federal government has appealed this ruling, and the case is now with the Supreme Court of that country. 3. PACKAGING AND OUTLET CONTROLS DEMONSTRATE SUCCESSFUL PUBLIC HEALTH APPROACH Haden, Mark works for Vancouver Coastal Health, Illicit IV Drugs: a Public Health Approach, Canadian Journal of Public Health, 93.6, 2002. Legalization with Product Under this model, product restrictions can be aimed at manufacturers, packagers, distributors, wholesalers and retailers. Drug packaging, marketing and method of sale would be specified. Advertising and promotion would be prohibited. Drugs would be sold in plain packaging with standardized weights. Retail outlet location, days and hours of operation would be controlled. The strength, formulation, method of use, and retail price of the drug would be regulated. The goal of these restrictions is to make the merchandise as neutral (or unattractive) as possible. Our society uses many "product" restrictions currently. Prescription drugs and tobacco have restrictions aimed at packaging and labelling, and when alcohol is sold, packaging and retail outlets are controlled.
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DRUG TREATMENT FOCUSES ON HEALTH IMPROVEMENT

1. TREATING OTHER ILLEGAL DRUGS THE WAY ALCOHOL IS TREATED ALLOWS MORE REGULATION Haden, Mark works for Vancouver Coastal Health, Illicit IV Drugs: a Public Health Approach, Canadian Journal of Public Health, 93.6, 2002. Market Regulation -This model would include all of the "product" restrictions as outlined above, and would also restrict purchasers. Restrictions on purchasers could include: age of purchaser, degree of intoxication of purchaser, volume rationing, proof of "need" in order to purchase, registrations of purchasers, proof of residency with purchase, limitations in allowed locations for use. This option is about regulating access to drugs. Using this option, a health care worker (e.g., nurse, counsellor, social worker) could assess the "customer" on a variety of factors, including degree of addiction, documented need, residency and age. These "customers" could then be registered and allowed to purchase a rationed amount, from licenced outlets, to be used in designated spaces (i.e., safe injection facilities, consumption rooms, home use). An active integrated prevention/public health education program integral to this model would also restrict customers. Currently our society uses some "customer" restrictions in sales of alcohol, where age and degree of intoxication of purchaser are factors in the sale. This option could be expanded considerably, beyond the alcohol sales model, to assist in bringing regulation to this currently uncontrolled market. 2. THE UNITED STATES GOVERNMENT HAS TREATED DRUG ABUSE AS A PUBLIC HEALTH ISSUE AND BELIEVES IT TO REQUIRE PUBLIC HEALTH SOLUTIONS Autry, Joseph is Acting Deputy Administrator of Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, Testimony on Oversight of Agency Efforts to Prevent and Treat Drug Abuse, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, March 18, 1999, accessed: 7/16/10, http://www.hhs.gov/asl/testify/t990318c.html The importance of our work in substance abuse prevention, addiction treatment and mental health services cannot be overstated. Drug and alcohol abuse ravage the lives of millions and fuel crime, domestic violence, disease and premature death. When the link is made between substance abuse and other headline grabbing problems -- unintended pregnancy, HIV/AIDS, crime, welfare, violence, school drop-out, suicide, homelessness, and injuries, substance abuse is clearly one of our most costly public health problems. As with any other public health problem, we must achieve public health solutions. Study after study has shown, drugs are dominating the public's concern about the future of children in this country. A survey of American adults found 56 percent listed drugs as the top problem facing American children. Crime was second, at 24 percent. 3. DRUG ABUSE TREATMENT ALWAYS FOCUSES ON THE HEALTH ASPECT OF IT Bevan, Gez is on the faculty of Applied Sciences at the University of Sunderland, Problem drug use the public health imperative: what some of the literature says, Substance Abuse Treatment, Prevention, and Policy, December 16, 2009, accessed: 7/16/10, http://www.substanceabusepolicy.com/content/4/1/21 Problem drug use treatment can typically be defined as interventions that directly address or ameliorate the negative effects of problematic drug use and cover a broad spectrum, from pharmacological interventions such as substitute prescribing and detoxification, through to psycho-social approaches including models of counselling and behaviour modification namely Cognitive Behavioural Therapy, Transtheoretical Model (cycle of change) & Motivational Interviewing as well as specific harm reduction interventions; needle exchange, Hepatitis screening and vaccination programmes. As important as the treatment and care is which directly addresses the problem drug use, focusing exclusively on these treatment interventions results in other drug use related issues such as sexual health, pregnancy, mental and psychological health falling outside the remit; the population's health benefits most from being addressed and managed from an inclusive i.e. public health and harm reductionist approach.
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ADDICTION MAKES ILLEGAL DRUG ABUSE A HEALTH ISSUE

1. TREATING ILLEGAL DRUGS AS PRESCRIPTION REDUCES ADDICTION Haden, Mark works for Vancouver Coastal Health, Illicit IV Drugs: a Public Health Approach, Canadian Journal of Public Health, 93.6, 2002. Allow drugs to be available on prescription Physicians could be allowed to prescribe currently illegal drugs for medicinal or maintenance purposes. Currently a special licence is required to prescribe our only "maintenance" drug, methadone. The special licence requirement results in some physicians opening specialized methadone clinics with hundreds of patients who, to the distress of local communities, congregate in the neighbourhood. Allowing all doctors to prescribe drugs like heroin and cocaine might dissipate drugabusing communities as this would increase the options available to addicts. Increasing the number of physicians who could prescribe these drugs may help to desegregate this disenfranchised population and promote reintegration into mainstream communities. 2. ADDICTION ALONE IS NOT SUFFICIENT FOR CRIMINAL PUNISHMENT Morse, Stephen J. is Ferdinand Wakeman Hubbell Professor of Law and Professor of Psychology and Law in Psychiatry at the University of Pennsylvania, Addiction, Genetics and Criminal Responsibility, Law and Contemporary Problems, 69.1-2, 2006. This account of criminal responsibility is most tightly linked to retributive justifications of punishment, which hold that punishment is not justified unless the offender morally deserves punishment because the offender was at fault and responsible, and that the offender never should be punished more than she deserves. It is generally conceded that desert is at least a necessary precondition for punishment in Anglo-American law. (19) The account is also consistent with consequential justifications for punishment, such as general deterrence. No offender, including an addict, should be punished unless he or she at least deserves such punishment. Even if good consequences might be achieved by punishing non-responsible addicts or by punishing responsible addicts more than they deserve, such punishment would require very weighty justification in a system that takes desert seriously. 3. ADDICTION IS A DISEASE EVEN IF THERE WERE RESPONSIBILITY IN BECOMING ADDICTED, ACTIONS AFTERWARD ARE LESS IN CONTROL Morse, Stephen J. is Ferdinand Wakeman Hubbell Professor of Law and Professor of Psychology and Law in Psychiatry at the University of Pennsylvania, Addiction, Genetics and Criminal Responsibility, Law and Contemporary Problems, 69.1-2, 2006. The concepts of illness and disease have powerful associations in our culture, most of which are inconsistent with the sufferer's responsibility for the features of the illness. People can, of course, be responsible for initially contracting or risking contracting diseases. A person who is overweight, does not exercise, and smokes surely is responsible for risking hypertension; the person who in inappropriate circumstances engages in unprotected sexual activity surely risks contracting sexually transmitted diseases. And a person who suffers from many diseases can ameliorate the consequences by intentionally adhering to a prescribed medical regimen. But hypertension and infections are themselves mechanisms. The sufferer cannot terminate all the signs and symptoms of the disease simply by intentionally choosing to cease being hypertensive or infected. Despite the potential contribution of human agency to the cause and maintenance of some diseases, no one denies that these are fundamentally diseases. Moreover, with many and perhaps most diseases, the sufferer is not responsible for contracting the disease, and for many diseases there is little or nothing the sufferer can do to help, other than to seek and cooperate with professional help and to wait for the disease to run its course. Although people sometimes can be complicit in their own diseases, the disease model is so powerful that people who are ill are not in general considered responsible for the signs, symptoms, and consequences. The dominant image of people with diseases is that they are the victims of pathological mechanisms who deserve sympathy and help and do not deserve condemnation.
19
DRUG USE IS INEVITABLY A HEALTH ISSUE

1. DRUG ABUSE IS INEVITABLE, THEREFORE IT SHOULD BE AN ISSUE OF USERS' HEALTH AS OPPOSED TO PENALIZING THEM Takahashi, Saul, was employed until March 2009 at the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, as Drug Control Officer in the Convention Evaluation Section of the International Narcotics Control Board Secretariat, Drug Control, Human Rights, and the Right to the Highest Attainable Standard of Health: By No Means Straightforward Issues, Human Rights Quarterly, 31.3, August 2009. NGOs have put forward similar arguments. Human Rights Watch, for example, has criticized the United States policy prohibiting the distribution of clean needles to drug addicts: The government penalizing people for attempting to protect themselves from [HIV] is blatant interference with the right to the highest attainable standard of health. . . . In reality, the scarcity of treatment programs and the very nature of drug use guarantee that there will always be people who either cannot or will not stop using drugs. Penalizing this population for using sterile syringes amounts to prescribing death as a punishment for illicit drug use. 2. DRUG ADDICTION IS OFTEN TREATED IN THE PUBLIC HEALTH SECTOR, AND THUS ISSUES PERTAINING TO IT SHOULD BE CONCEPTUALIZED AS SUCH Bevan, Gez is on the faculty of Applied Sciences at the University of Sunderland, Problem drug use the public health imperative: what some of the literature says, Substance Abuse Treatment, Prevention, and Policy, December 16, 2009, accessed: 7/16/10, http://www.substanceabusepolicy.com/content/4/1/21 With more than 200,000 problem drug users is contact with structured treatment services in England the public health imperative behind drug treatment is great. Problem drug use for many is a chronic and relapsing condition, where "cure" is often neither a reasonable or appropriate expectation and it can further be argued that in these circumstances problem drug use is no different from any number of chronic and enduring health conditions that are managed in the health care system and therefore should be conceptualised as such.
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CRIMINAL JUSTICE DOESN'T SOLVE PUBLIC HEALTH

1. CRIMINALIZATION OF DRUG USAGE UNDERMINES PUBLIC HEALTH EFFORTS Takahashi, Saul, was employed until March 2009 at the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, as Drug Control Officer in the Convention Evaluation Section of the International Narcotics Control Board Secretariat, Drug Control, Human Rights, and the Right to the Highest Attainable Standard of Health: By No Means Straightforward Issues, Human Rights Quarterly, 31.3, August 2009. Some organizations have gone so far as to state that there is a fundamental conflict between the prohibition of drugs and the right to health. The Beckley Foundation argues that there is an inherent tension between prohibition on the one hand, and health and human rights concerns on the other.Similar assessments are made by Canada HIV/AIDS Legal Network, which states that the criminalisation of people who use drugs is undermining public health efforts, including the response to HIV . . . among people who use drugs [and] stigmatising people who use drugs through criminalising them undermines their human rights.Human Rights Watch argues that the ideology of the war on drug shas trumped both reason and reality . . . and violated the human right of injection drug users to take steps to protect their health. Even WHO, UNODC, and UNAIDS stated in a joint publication promoting needle exchange programs that the [p]rotection of human rights is critical for preventing HIV as people are more vulnerable to infection when their economic, health, social or cultural rights are not respected. Equally, a punitive approach, based overtly on criminal justice measures, succeeds only in driving underground those people most in need of prevention and care services. 2. RECOGNIZING SHORTCOMINGS IN DRUG LAW SOLVES DRUG ABUSE BEST Rangel, Charles B. is a congressman for New York's 15th District, Why Drug Legalization Should Be Opposed, Criminal Justice Ethics, 17.2, 1998 The issue should not be whether or not drugs should be legalized. Rather, we need to focus on changing the way the war on drugs is being fought. The real problems are our emphasis on incarceration, including mandatory minimum sentences, the unfair application of drug laws, the disparity in sentencing between crack cocaine and powder cocaine, and the failure to concentrate on the root causes of drug abuse. These shortcomings in our drug policy should not become a license for legalization. Many critics of the drug war have the knowledge and skills to improve our national drug control policy. Instead of supporting the Drug Czar, they use their resources to blast all efforts to eradicate drugs in this country. It is a shame that many educated and prominent people suggest that the only dangerous thing about drugs is that they are illegal.
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TREATING DRUG ABUSE AS A MATTER OF PUBLIC HEALTH MAINTAINS FEDERALISM

1. MEDICINAL MARIJUANA IS LEGAL UNDER MANY STATE LAWS AND DOES NOT VIOLATE ANY FEDERAL LAWS Herman, Caroline, United States V. Oakland Cannabis Buyers Cooperative: Whatever Happened to Federalism? Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology, 93.1, 2002. Since the passage of Proposition 215, several individuals have created non-profit "medical cannabis dispensaries" or "cooperatives" to provide marijuana for seriously ill patients upon a physician's recommendation. To date, approximately twenty-five cannabis cooperatives have been established in California. The organizers claim that prior to the creation of these dispensaries, qualified patients were forced to purchase marijuana, if they could at all, on the black market, paying excessive prices for questionable quality marijuana. In these cooperatives, a physician serves as medical director, and registered nurses staff the organization during business hours. To become a member of a Cooperative, patients are required to provide a written statement from a treating physician agreeing to marijuana therapy, and the patient then must go through a screening interview. If a patient is accepted, he receives an identification card that allows him to procure marijuana from the Cooperative. In January of 1998, more than a year after California voters passed Proposition 215, the United States filed six separate lawsuits against six independent cannabis dispensaries and individuals involved with the dispensaries. Pursuant to Local Rule 3-12, all six cases were reassigned to the United States District Court for the Northern District of California as related cases. The United States alleged that the defendants violated federal law under the CSA whether or not the defendants' activities were legal under California law. Specifically, the federal government alleged that the defendants' manufacture and distribution of marijuana violated 21 U.S.C. section 841 (a)(1); their use of facilities (the actual locations) for the purpose of manufacture and distribution violated 21 U.S.C. section 856(a)(1); and the individual defendants' conspiracy to violate the CSA violated 21 U.S.C. section 846. Thus, the United States sought to preliminarily and permanently enjoin the Cooperative from distributing and manufacturing marijuana under 21 U.S.C. section 882(a), which provides federal district courts with jurisdiction to enjoin violations of the Act. The Cooperative argued that the court should dismiss the federal government's claims because 21 U.S.C. section 841(a) exceeded Congress's authority under the Commerce Clause. The defendants further argued that just as Congress did not have the authority to regulate possession of a firearm in a school zone, as the Supreme Court held in Lopez, Congress also did not have the authority to regulate their purely intrastate conduct because the marijuana was both manufactured and distributed solely within California. The court placed the defendants' arguments into three categories: (1) defendants have not violated federal law; (2) defendants have valid defenses to their violation of the law; and (3) equitable principles preclude injunctive relief. 2. IT HAS BEEN RULED THAT CONGRESS CANNOT PREVENT DISTRIBUTION OF MEDICINAL MARIJUANA TO SERIOUSLY ILL PATIENTS IT DOES NOT VIOLATE THE COMMERCE CLAUSE Herman, Caroline, United States V. Oakland Cannabis Buyers Cooperative: Whatever Happened to Federalism? Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology, 93.1, 2002. First, the court held that it has jurisdiction to hear the case because the CSA does not exceed Congress's power under the Commerce Clause. The court asserted that when Congress declares that an entire class of activities affects commerce, courts have no power to "'excise, as trivial individual instances'" of the class. The court pointed to Congress's detailed findings that intrastate cultivation, distribution and possession of controlled substances have "a substantial and direct effect upon interstate commerce." The court also stressed that since Lopez was decided, the Ninth Circuit has held that Congress's enactment of the CSA is permissible under the Commerce Clause. The court rejected the defendants' argument that distribution of marijuana to seriously ill patients is not within the class of activities that Congress sought to regulate with the CSA, arguing that even if such activity falls into a different class, that class also substantially affects interstate commerce. The court decided that there is nothing about the nature of medical marijuana that limits it to intrastate cultivation or distribution. The court concluded that distribution, even "if done for the humanitarian purpose of service the legitimate health care needs of seriously ill patients," can affect interstate commerce .
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TREATING DRUG ABUSE AS PUBLIC HEALTH IS A STATE ISSUE

1. EMPIRICAL CASES THAT RULE IN FAVOR OF FEDERAL GOVERNMENT POWER ARE WRONG
Herman, Caroline, United States V. Oakland Cannabis Buyers Cooperative: Whatever Happened to Federalism? Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology, 93.1, 2002. The Supreme Court's decision in Oakland is incomplete in that it ignores the critical underlying issue that is necessary to resolve this case: whether the CSA's regulation of wholly intrastate cultivation, possession, and use of medical marijuana, sanctioned by California law, exceeds Congress's enumerated power under the Commerce Clause. The "first principles" of federalism command the Court to intervene in cases such as Oakland in which tension exists between state and federal law and in which Congress seeks to regulate wholly intrastate activities under its Commerce Clause power. Furthermore, because the Court in Oakland failed to address this crucial issue, the decision is inconsistent with the Rehnquist Court's reinvigorated loyalty to federalism and to reining in Congress's commerce power. Lastly, had the Court examined the CSA under the heightened scrutiny of Lopez and Morrison, its decision should have been radically different because a heightened review of the CSA under Lopez and Morrison reveals that the Act's regulation of wholly intrastate cultivation, possession and use of state sanctioned medical marijuana exceeds Congress's commerce power. 2. EMPIRICAL CASES THAT RULED IN FAVOR OF THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT FAILED TO ADDRESS KEY ISSUES WITHIN THE CASE Herman, Caroline, United States V. Oakland Cannabis Buyers Cooperative: Whatever Happened to Federalism? Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology, 93.1, 2002. Justice Thomas's opinion in Oakland ignores a crucial issue that is necessary to resolve this case: does Congress's attempt to regulate the wholly intrastate activity of distribution of marijuana for medical purposes under the CSA exceed the power afforded to Congress by the Commerce Clause? In Oakland, the Court held that the language and the structure of the CSA abrogate the discretion of federal courts to balance potential harms in issuing injunctions and eliminate the medical necessity defense. The next logical and necessary question the Court should have addressed is whether such a broad statute, which, according to the majority, lies beyond the reach of both the federal courts and the states, exceeds Congress's enumerated commerce power. Had the Court addressed this issue, it should have found that the CSA, as it is applied to conduct related to the medical use of marijuana, is, at the very least, highly constitutionally suspect. 3. ISSUES OF PUBLIC HEALTH SUCH AS MEDICINAL MARIJUANA OUGHT TO BE TREATED AS AN ISSUE OF FEDERALISM AND DELEGATED TO THE STATES Herman, Caroline, United States V. Oakland Cannabis Buyers Cooperative: Whatever Happened to Federalism? Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology, 93.1, 2002. In order to avoid an all-powerful central government and to ensure state sovereignty, the Constitution declares the federal government to be one of enumerated powers. Furthermore, the Tenth Amendment proclaims that "[t]he powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people." One of the enumerated powers granted to Congress by the Constitution is the power to "regulate Commerce with Foreign Nations, and among the several states, and with the Indian Tribes," known generally as the commerce power. Police powers, including the protection of public health, safety, and morals of citizens, are left to the states, however. Nevertheless, despite its lack of a "police power," Congress has passed federal criminal laws, relying on its power under the Commerce Clause to do so, including the CSA. Justice Thomas skirts the federalism issue in the Oakland decision by merely stating that the Court is not deciding any constitutional issues in this opinion. However, as pointed out by Justice Stevens in his concurrence, federalism clearly plays a crucial role in the strained relationship between California's Proposition 215 (and similar laws in eight other states) and the GSA. First, medical marijuana falls into two categories traditionally left to the state: health care and criminal law enforcement. In enacting the CSA, Congress claimed that it intended to allow the states to freely exercise their independent authority over public health. Second, the medical marijuana issue in this case involves a situation in which a state has chosen to "serve as a laboratory" in the trial of a "novel social and economic experiment." Thus, because of these two considerations, the paramount principles of federalism impose a duty on the federal courts, including the Supreme Court, to settle and minimize the conflict between federal and state law at issue in Oakland.
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NEGATIVE CASE
I negate the resolution Resolved: The abuse of illegal drugs ought to be treated as a matter of public health, not of criminal justice. VALUE: JUSTICE Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary, 2006, Merriam-Webster, Inc., http://www.m-w.com The maintenance or administration of what is just especially by the impartial adjustment of conflicting claims or the assignment of merited rewards or punishments. CRITERION: UPHOLDING THE LAW Upholding laws set in place is the only way to achieve the value of justice, since justice is delegated based on existing laws. This is the most objective standard by which to evaluate this debate because it is easy to tell if decidedly illegal drug abuse falls outside and is contrary to current laws. This provides a clear outline based on the text of the law and whether or not that action upholds the law or does not. IMPORTANT DEFINITIONS ILLEGAL DRUGS, FROM BUSINESS DICTIONARY. Habit forming stimulant or narcotic substance (such as alcohol, cannabis, nicotine, or a derivative of cocoa or poppy) which produces a state of arousal, contentment, or euphoria. Continued or excessive use (called drug abuse or substance abuse) of such substances causes addiction or dependence. Thereafter any attempt to discontinue their use results in specific reactions (called withdrawal symptoms) such as sweating, vomiting, and tremors which cease when the use is resumed. Also called illegal drug where its production and/or use is prohibited. Whether a substance is legal or illegal, however, may have nothing to do with its potential for addiction or harm: alcohol and nicotine, both addictive and harmful, are legal in most countries because they generate substantial employment or government revenue through taxes. The above definition indicates which drugs are outlawed, and overarching reasons why this is so. This indicates that there are specific drugs being spoken about in a legal or illegal context, and should be considered when evaluating todays debate. CONTENTION ONE: ILLEGAL DRUG ABUSE IS A CRIMINAL ISSUE REGARDLESS OF CAUSE OR RESULT OF ILLEGAL DRUG ABUSE, THERE IS STILL AN OBLIGATION TO THE LAW Morse, Stephen J. is Ferdinand Wakeman Hubbell Professor of Law and Professor of Psychology and Law in Psychiatry at the University of Pennsylvania, Addiction, Genetics and Criminal Responsibility, Law and Contemporary Problems, 69.1-2, 2006. Criminal law's concept of the person, including the addict, is the antithesis of the medical model's mechanistic concept. Although all honest people will admit that biological and environmental variables beyond the person's rational control can cause an agent to be the type of person who is predisposed to commit crimes or can put the agent in the kind of environment that predisposes people to criminal activity, the law ultimately views the criminal wrongdoer as an agent and not simply as a passive victim who manifests pathological mechanisms. (15) Unless either the person does not act or an excusing condition is present, agency entails moral and legal responsibility that warrants blame and punishment. Suffering from a disease simpliciter, such as schizophrenia, does not itself mean that the defendant did not act or that an excusing condition obtained, although diseases and other causes may negate action or produce an excusing condition, such as gross irrationality. Most mental and physical diseases--even severe disorders--suffered by people who violate the criminal law do not have these exculpating effects because they do not sufficiently affect rational agency concerning criminal activity. (16) Even if addiction is properly characterized as an illness, most addicts are nonetheless capable of being guided by good reasons, including the incentives law can provide. (17) Sick people who behave immorally or who violate the criminal law are almost always responsible agents.
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CONTENTION TWO: TREATING ILLEGAL DRUG ABUSE AS A CRIMINAL ISSUE SOLVES HEALTH CONCERNS CRIMINAL JUSTICE ALLOWS DRUG ABUSERS TO GET THE HELP AND TREATMENT THEY NEED National Institute of Drug Abuse, Treating Offenders with Drug Problems: Integrating Public Health and Public Safety, National Institutes of Health, March 2009, accessed 7/10/10 http://www.nida.nih.gov/tib/drugs_crime.html Substance abusing individuals in the criminal justice system have a host of complicated health problems. Involvement in the criminal justice system provides an opportunity to diagnose and treat these health problems, which include infectious diseases. The prevalence of AIDS is estimated to be approximately five times higher among incarcerated individuals than in the general population. In addition, individuals in the criminal justice system represent a significant proportion of all cases of hepatitis B and C infection and tuberculosis in the United States. Increasing participation in drug abuse treatment can decrease the spread of these diseases by reducing risky behaviors, such as sharing injection equipment and having unprotected sex. It is a public health and safety issue that cannot go unheeded.
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NEGATIVE EVIDENCE EXTENSIONS

PUBLIC HEALTH DOESN'T CHANGE DRUG USE PATTERNS
1. TREATING DRUG ABUSE AS A HEALTH ISSUE DOES NOTHING TO ADDRESS ABUSE ITSELF Takahashi, Saul, was employed until March 2009 at the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, as Drug Control Officer in the Convention Evaluation Section of the International Narcotics Control Board Secretariat, Drug Control, Human Rights, and the Right to the Highest Attainable Standard of Health: By No Means Straightforward Issues, Human Rights Quarterly, 31.3, August 2009. The concept of harm reduction and the specific measures described above remain controversial. Harm reduction does nothing to address the abuse of the drugs itself; that is not its objective. To those who are against needle exchange programs and injection rooms, these measures amount to condoning and facilitating drug abuse and to discarding the goal of eradicating drug abuse altogether. The United States in particular is vehemently opposed to harm reduction and regularly makes statements at the CND that such practices assist people in using or abusing drugs and contribute to undermining global counter drug efforts.Advocates of harm reduction see things very differently; to them, harm reduction measures are pragmatic tools that take into account the reality of drug abuse and try at least to help drug addicts protect themselves from communicable diseases or overdose. The debate in international drug control circles is polarized and acrimonious and shows little sign of abating. 2. CHANGING THE LEGAL STATUS OF DRUGS DOES NOT CHANGE USE PATTERNS, MEANING IT SHOULD BE A CRIMINAL ISSUE Institute For Behavior and Health, focuses on national drug abuse policies that emphasize prevention and investment in better treatment approaches, What's Wrong with Legalizing Illegal Drugs, March 24, 2009, http://www.ibhinc.org/pdfs/WhatsWrongwithLegalizingIllegalDrugs32409.pdf The analogy to legal gambling is instructive. Today no one talks about curbing illegal gambling as a goal of legal gambling because the data is clear: legal gambling builds the business of illegal gambling. The same would be true for the legal availability of formerly illegal drugs. By making drugs legal there would be a large increase in illegal drug use (as there has been in illegal gambling). The illegal drug suppliers would thrive by selling more potent products outside of the taxation and restrictions that all governments would place on a regulated and legal drug supply. 3. CERTAIN DRUGS SUCH AS HEROIN OR COCAINE NEED TO MAINTAIN THEIR CRIMINAL STATUS SINCE ADDICTION IS MORE LIKELY Shepard, Edward is Associate Professor and Chair of the Department of Economics at LeMoyne College, and Blackley, Paul R. is a Professor in the Department of Economics at LeMoyne College, U.S. Drug Control Policies: Federal Spending on Law Enforcement versus Treatment in Public Health Outcomes, Journal of Drug Issues, 34.4, 2004. Law enforcement approaches to the nation's drug policy may influence public health in several ways. In theory, the effects of law enforcement approaches arrests, incarceration, interdiction - on the public health could be positive or negative. If law enforcement approaches are successful in reducing supply and deterring demand through stiffer penalties and greater risk of arrest, then the outcome should be reduced drug use, with an uncertain effect on drug prices. If law enforcement approaches, as commonly believed, have greater effects on the supply side, then prices should increase. With successful deterrence and interdiction along with higher prices, outcomes such as the use, abuse, and addiction associated with illegal drugs should be lower. Thus, if many potential users find participation too risky or are dissuaded by high prices, then there should be less drug abuse and fewer addicts, thereby reducing the related public health costs. Sickness, disease, and increased mortality are additional consequences of drug addiction. These outcomes should also decline with reductions in the size of the market. Several scholars, including Wilson (1990) and Kleiman (1992), have opposed a legal, regulated market for heroin or cocaine because of expected increases in drug addiction and the associated social costs. Wilson (1990, p. 57) argued that while a legalized market might provide some benefits in the form of reduced crime, "Some, perhaps a great deal, of the gain would be offset by the great increase in the number of addicts." Kleiman (1992, p. 307) opposed a legal, regulated market for cocaine because it "...is likely to give rise to self-destructive habits for an unacceptably large proportion of users."
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DRUG ABUSE LEADS TO CRIME

1. DRUG ABUSE IS LINKED TO OTHER CRIMINAL ACTIVITY Fajnzylber, Pablo, is Senior Economist in Latin America & the Caribbean Region, Lederman, Daniel, is is Senior Economist in the World Bank's Development Economics Research Group, and Loayza, Norman, is lead economist in the research department of the World Bank, Crime and Victimization: An Economic Perspective, Economia, 1.1, 2000. Two issues that have recently received special attention from economists and other social scientists are the relation between crime and drugs and the explanation of youth crime participation. For instance, Blumstein shows that the homicide rate among youth aged eighteen and under, the number of homicides committed by juveniles with guns, and the arrest rate on drug charges among nonwhite juveniles all more than doubled between the mid-1980s and the early 1990s. The same period saw no growth in the homicide rate among adults aged twenty-four and older and no growth in either the drugrelated arrest rate for white juveniles or the number of juvenile homicides not involving guns. Blumstein attributes these worrisome trends to changes in the illegal drug market that were brought about by the introduction of crack cocaine. Because of its low price, crack cocaine attracted a larger number of buyers and led to an increase in the number of transactions. This, in turn, led to a considerable increase in the number of drug sellers, who are usually recruited among inner-city juveniles because of their lower opportunity costs and because of the relatively lenient punishments they face when caught. Because most drug dealers carry guns for self-protection and because dispute resolution in the illegal drug market is often violent, the growth of the crack cocaine market was accompanied by an increased diffusion of guns among juveniles. This, Blumstein argues, led to a greater incidence of both drug- and non-drug-related lethal violence among youth. 2. CONSUMPTION OF ILLEGAL DRUGS INCREASES GUN CRIMES BECAUSE OF THE DANGEROUS NATURE OF THE MARKET Fajnzylber, Pablo, is Senior Economist in Latin America & the Caribbean Region, Lederman, Daniel, is is Senior Economist in the World Bank's Development Economics Research Group, and Loayza, Norman, is lead economist in the research department of the World Bank, Crime and Victimization: An Economic Perspective, Economia, 1.1, 2000. Two issues that have recently received special attention from economists and other social scientists are the relation between crime and drugs and the explanation of youth crime participation. For instance, Blumstein shows that the homicide rate among youth aged eighteen and under, the number of homicides committed by juveniles with guns, and the arrest rate on drug charges among nonwhite juveniles all more than doubled between the mid-1980s and the early 1990s. The same period saw no growth in the homicide rate among adults aged twenty-four and older and no growth in either the drugrelated arrest rate for white juveniles or the number of juvenile homicides not involving guns. Blumstein attributes these worrisome trends to changes in the illegal drug market that were brought about by the introduction of crack cocaine. Because of its low price, crack cocaine attracted a larger number of buyers and led to an increase in the number of transactions. This, in turn, led to a considerable increase in the number of drug sellers, who are usually recruited among inner-city juveniles because of their lower opportunity costs and because of the relatively lenient punishments they face when caught. Because most drug dealers carry guns for self-protection and because dispute resolution in the illegal drug market is often violent, the growth of the crack cocaine market was accompanied by an increased diffusion of guns among juveniles. This, Blumstein argues, led to a greater incidence of both drug- and non-drug-related lethal violence among youth.
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DRUG ABUSE SHOULD BE TREATED BOTH AS HEALTH AND CRIMINAL

1. IT IS IMPOSSIBLE TO RULE WHICH DIRECTIONHEALTH OR CRIMINALDRUGS SHOULD BE TREATED Institute For Behavior and Health, focuses on national drug abuse policies that emphasize prevention and investment in better treatment approaches, What's Wrong with Legalizing Illegal Drugs, March 24, 2009, http://www.ibhinc.org/pdfs/WhatsWrongwithLegalizingIllegalDrugs32409.pdf In the past, proposals to legalize drugs have suffered from the same pitfall into which the current series of articles in The Economist finds itself. Virtually the entire content is devoted to the costs of keeping drugs illegal. For example The Economist's headline story, Prohibition has failed is followed by page after page of horror stories about drug trafficking. All of the legalization proposals neglect to deliver a comprehensive plan for what to legalize (all drugs? all doses? all routes of administration?). The legalization devil is in the never-described details. The reason a fleshed-out proposal to legalize all drugs is not to be found in this or any other publication is that it cannot be done. Any realistic proposal for legalization would be so frightening and so obviously destructive that it would be a political non-starter, or so limited that it would be irrelevant to the goal of eliminating illegal drug trafficking. 2. WAR ON DRUGS IS A RESULT OF A COMBINATION OF BOTH CRIMINAL AND HEALTH CONCERNS Yuill, Kevin is Senior Lecturer in American Studies at the University of Sunderland, Another Take on the Nixon Presidency: The First Therapeutic President? Journal of Policy History, 21.2, 2009. Why was there this manufactured epidemic Katherine Beckett identifies the motive behind Nixon declared War on Drugs as the need to fulfill the anti-crime agenda. The federal government had little power to tackle crime except in a few areas, of which narcotics control was one. The war on drugs was thus a last-ditch attempt to reduce the crime rates to which the administration itself had drawn so much attention. Nixon did, however, express a genuine horror at the destructive capacity of drugs. Some of his notations in the voluminous news reports sent to him each day indicate the issues that moved the him. In December 1969, Nixon was obviously affected by the story of the death of twelve-year-old Walter by heroin use. Nixon scrawled Moynihannote and later terrible. Nixon's drug czar, Jerome H. Jaffe, remembered about his boss: It's clear that he had very strong feelings about it. He felt that drug use really eroded the fabric of society. It wasn't just that this policy was a way to reduce crime. . . . I felt that it wasn't just for political purposes that he wanted to do this. If the major concern was to lower crime rates, a therapeutic approach was at least an imaginative method. Rather than a straightforward, Reaganite just say no or a simple law-and-order crackdown, Nixon increased expenditures most of all in prevention. A critic of Reagan's war on drugs, Leif Rosenberger, noted: In all the Nixon administration devoted $3bn to anti-drug activities, and most of it was finally being spent more wisely on prevention and treatment. Nixon reorganized the federal anti-drugs effort to emphasize treatment as an alternative to prison, hardly the actions of someone solely concerned with his law-and-order image. The period from 1971 to 1975 was, as Karl J. Besteman has noted, the most fruitful and productive in federal history in establishing and expanding drug-treatment services. Other books go even further in praising the Nixon administration's efforts. 3. DRUG EPIDEMIC WAS OVERSTATED WHICH MADE DRUG ABUSE A HEALTH AND CRIMINAL ISSUE Yuill, Kevin is Senior Lecturer in American Studies at the University of Sunderland, Another Take on the Nixon Presidency: The First Therapeutic President? Journal of Policy History, 21.2, 2009. Nixon's initial interest in drugs as an issue seemed to be in its ability to galvanize Americans into an anti-drugs crusade; not until 1971 did the drugs issue evolve into a therapeutic point of contact within the ghettoes. Upon taking office, Nixon attacked the scourge of drugs. While a real problem for many families and individuals, particularly in poor areas, Nixon clearly hyped the problem. Edward J. Epstein noted the way the administration calculated the total number of heroin addicts, rivaling the infamous message of crime figures. Figures released showed an alarming rise in the number of heroin addicts, from 68,000 in 1969 to 315,000 in 1970 to 559,000 in 1971. Nixon declared somewhat dramatically in March 1970 that the scourge of Narcotics has swept the younger generation like an epidemic. However, this rise came about because the Bureau of Narcotics and Dangerous Drugs decided to reinterpret the 1969 data, which were collated by a compilation of reports by local police departments. Instead of simply adding together all the reported addicts, the bureau estimated those missed by local police departments by first quadrupling, then octupling, the number of known addicts. As Epstein noted: Evidence emerged that by 1971 there was actually a reduction in addicts. Dan Baum concluded that drugs were such a tiny health problem as to be statistically insignificant,pointing out that more people choked to death on food or died falling down the stairs in the United States each year than succumbed to illegal drugs.
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DRUGS SHOULD NOT BE LEGALIZED

1. USING DRUGS AS A MEANS OF HEALTH LEADS TO MORE DEATHS, KEEP THEM ILLEGAL Institute For Behavior and Health, focuses on national drug abuse policies that emphasize prevention and investment in better treatment approaches, What's Wrong with Legalizing Illegal Drugs, March 24, 2009, http://www.ibhinc.org/pdfs/WhatsWrongwithLegalizingIllegalDrugs32409.pdf The canary in the coal mine for drug legalization is found in the current explosive growth of the abuse of prescribed opiates. In the US deaths from prescription opiates now exceed the deaths from heroin and cocaine combined. Additionally, every year since 2005 more Americans have started using these drugs without having their own valid prescription than have begun using marijuana. Within the rapidly growing prescription drug problem there is little or no illegal trafficking and yet the health consequences are tragic. This experience shows that it is the use of drugs that creates most of the costs of the drug problem and not as The Economist and other critics of restrictive drug policies would have us believe, that the costs are a consequence of drug prohibition, including illegal drug trafficking. 2. DRUG LEGALIZATION WILL COST MORE IN THE LONG RUN Rangel, Charles B. is a congressman for New York's 15th District, Why Drug Legalization Should Be Opposed, Criminal Justice Ethics, 17.2, 1998. Drug legalization threatens to undermine our society. The argument about the economic costs associated with the drug war is a selfish argument that coincides with the short-sighted planning that we have been using with other social policies. With any legalization of drugs, related problems would not go away; they would only intensify. If we legalize, we will be paying much more than the $30 billion per year we now spend on direct health care costs associated with illegal drug use. 3. LEGALIZATION LEADS TO THE SAME ILLEGAL USE WITH MORE ACCESS Rangel, Charles B. is a congressman for New York's 15th District, Why Drug Legalization Should Be Opposed, Criminal Justice Ethics, 17.2, 1998 Drug legalization is not as simple as opening a chain of friendly neighborhood "drug" stores. While I agree that some drugs might be beneficial for medicinal purposes, this value should not be exploited to suggest that drugs should be legalized. Great Britain's experience with prescription heroin should provide a warning. Until 1968, British doctors were freely allowed to prescribe drugs to addicts for medicinal purposes. Due to the lack of rigorous controls, some serious problems became associated with this policy. Doctors supplied drugs to non-addicts, and addicts supplied legally obtained drugs to the general population resulting in an increased rate of addiction. There is plenty of evidence to show that drug legalization has not worked in other countries that have tried it. The United States cannot afford such experiments when the data shows that drug legalization policies are failing in other countries.
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CRIMINAL JUSTICE SOLVES PUBLIC HEALTH CONCERNS

1. REDUCTION OF CRIMINAL PENALTIES MAINTAINS ALL THE BENEFITS OF PUBLIC HEALTH WHILE KEEPING BENEFITS OF CRIMINAL JUSTICE Haden, Mark works for Vancouver Coastal Health, Illicit IV Drugs: a Public Health Approach, Canadian Journal of Public Health, 93.6, 2002. Depenalization While existing laws are maintained, the penalties for possession could be significantly reduced. Penalties under this option are: discharges, diversion to treatment instead of jail for significant charges (possession of large amounts and trafficking), and "parking ticket" status for possession of small amounts of drugs for personal consumption. Reduction of criminal charges, for possession of drugs, does not remove personal responsibility for an individual's behaviour, like driving while intoxicated or violence. 2. CRIMINAL JUSTICE APPROACHES TO ILLEGAL DRUG ABUSE SOLVE ANY CONCERNS PUBLIC HEALTH HAS Shepard, Edward is Associate Professor and Chair of the Department of Economics at LeMoyne College, and Blackley, Paul R. is a Professor in the Department of Economics at LeMoyne College, U.S. Drug Control Policies: Federal Spending on Law Enforcement versus Treatment in Public Health Outcomes, Journal of Drug Issues, 34.4, 2004. Implicit in the emphasis upon strict law enforcement approaches, including prohibition, is the assumption that they offer relatively higher net benefits to society compared to other policies. Since drug use is commonly associated with serious health consequences, the benefits of successful drug control policies should include reduced health costs such as fewer illnesses, addictions, overdoses, and emergency room visits. Other possible benefits include reduced crime (e.g., fewer robberies or assaults by addicts needing money for drugs), increased productivity in the workplace, and a better quality of life throughout society because of lower levels of drug use. 3. LEGAL RESTRICTIONS ON COCAINE EFFECTIVELY REDUCED USE Spillane, Joseph is Associate Professor of History at the University of Floriday, Did Drug Prohibition Work?: Reflections on the End of the First Cocaine Experience in the United States, 1910-45, Journal of Drug Issues, 28.2, 1998. Historical accounts attribute the declining-use trend to either a reduction in user demand or increased difficulty in obtaining cocaine, whereas some simply acknowledge the confusion over whether disappearing supplies were a "cause or consequence of the decline in interest" (Grinspoon and Bakalar 1976:47). The most common supply-control argument focuses on the impact of restrictive legislation, and on the ability of law enforcement to marginalize distribution networks (to "drive them underground") and, thereby, increase the cost of using cocaine. The term cost here is meant to suggest both price and availability. The latter incorporates many aspects of cocaine use, including the involvement of law enforcement, and the relative ease or difficulty in locating sources of supply. In addition to the role of the criminal law and law enforcement, this report briefly considers two other hypothesized causes for a reduction in cocaine's availability-the disruption of supply and the diversion of supply. The former refers to the suggestion that disruptive events (World War I, for example), may have effectively cut off supplies to the United States and precipitated a decline in consumption. The latter has scarcely been considered in the existing literature, but concerns the possibility that legal cocaine production may have sought out less-regulated markets outside the United States.
30
ADDICTION IS NO EXCUSE
1. DRUG ADDICTION IS A LEARNED BEHAVIOR AND SHOULD BE REINFORCED PUNITIVELY Morse, Stephen J. is Ferdinand Wakeman Hubbell Professor of Law and Professor of Psychology and Law in Psychiatry at the University of Pennsylvania, Addiction, Genetics and Criminal Responsibility, Law and Contemporary Problems, 69.1-2, 2006. It can be inferred from the addict's report about his or her own thoughts and feelings and from the negative consequences of addiction-related actions that the addict is driven by an overwhelming or overpowering desire termed "craving" and that drug seeking and using are "compulsive." But the environment and expectations play a weighty role in the addict's experience of craving and use. Addiction is a condition that is eliminated by large numbers of craving sufferers simply by intentionally ceasing to seek and use, and many cease craving after they quit. In many cases, the addict is able to quit because she finally has sufficient reason to do so, and many addicts "age out" of addiction. Even if addiction is properly and most usefully characterized as a disease, at the extreme its necessary behavioral signs are virtually all reward-sensitive or reason-responsive. An addict threatened with instant death for seeking and using will not seek and use unless she already wishes to die at that moment or does not care if she does. (9) 2. RESPONSIBILITY IS ZERO SUM Morse, Stephen J. is Ferdinand Wakeman Hubbell Professor of Law and Professor of Psychology and Law in Psychiatry at the University of Pennsylvania, Addiction, Genetics and Criminal Responsibility, Law and Contemporary Problems, 69.1-2, 2006. The alleged incompatibility of determinism and responsibility is foundational. Determinism is not a continuum concept that applies to various individuals in various degrees. There is no partial or selective determinism. Responsibility is possible or it is not, tout court, if the universe is deterministic. If human beings are fully subject to the causal laws of the universe, as a thoroughly physicalist, naturalist worldview holds, then many philosophers claim that "ultimate" responsibility is impossible from the start. (23) On the other hand, plausible "compatibilist" theories suggest that responsibility is possible in a deterministic universe. (24) There seems no resolution to this debate in sight, but our moral and legal practices do not treat everyone or no one as responsible. Determinism cannot be guiding our practices. If one wants to excuse addicts because they are genetically determined or determined for any other reason to be addicts, one is committed to negating the possibility of responsibility for anything. 3. ADDICTION ITSELF SHOULD NOT BE A CRIME, CRIMES ASSOCIATED WITH IT SHOULD BE Morse, Stephen J. is Ferdinand Wakeman Hubbell Professor of Law and Professor of Psychology and Law in Psychiatry at the University of Pennsylvania, Addiction, Genetics and Criminal Responsibility, Law and Contemporary Problems, 69.1-2, 2006. An agent will not be held responsible for anatomical, physiological, or psychological states associated with addiction, but the addict potentially may be held responsible for addiction-associated actions such as possession, use, or other crimes motivated by the desire to obtain and use drugs. Thus, the addict must be evaluated as an acting agent, a person who acts for reasons, and not simply as a biophysical mechanism. This would be true even if craving and compulsive seeking and using drugs were the inevitable, mechanistic outcome of a single-gene defect. The question, then, is how to assess the responsibility of an agent acting intentionally and unlawfully, but apparently compulsively in response to cravings. The criminal actions of addicts are in fact actions, not mechanisms, even if they may also be properly characterized as signs of disease or brain pathology, and discovery of biological or psychosocial causes does not per se negate agency and create an excusing condition. All actions have biological and nonbiological causes. The agent is not an addict unless the person seeks and uses the drug. And when she seeks and uses, she acts. She is not legally unconscious, even according to the most extravagantly narrow definition of action, and she surely acts intentionally. Genetically induced pathology may be a prime source of a craving, and compulsive action to satisfy the craving may produce harmful consequences, but activity to satisfy the craving for drugs is nonetheless action. The core definition of addiction entails this. The question, therefore, is whether addicts should be excused for their addiction-related actions. This part begins an answer with consideration of those features of addiction-related behavior--craving and compulsion--that are most relevant to an assessment of the criminal law's excusing conditions of lack of rationality and legal compulsion. It continues by addressing the two primary theoretical candidates for why actions motivated by cravings and compulsions might be excused--the internal compulsion and irrationality theories. Finally, it turns to society's responsibility for addiction-related behaviors and whether such responsibility negates or lessens individual responsibility.
31
PRENATAL DRUG ABUSE SHOULD BE A CRIMINAL OFFENSE

1. PRENATAL DRUG ABUSE HAS DEVASTATING AFFECTS ON FETUSES AND NEWBORNS THAT LAST THE ENTIRETY OF THEIR LIVES Fortney, Susan, A Jurisprudential Analysis of Government Intervention and Prenatal Drug Abuse, Journal of Law and Health, 17.1, 2002. An evaluation of government intervention to curb prenatal drug use requires a basic understanding of the effects of drug use by pregnant women. Given the maternal-fetal link, drugs such as cocaine directly and indirectly affect the fetus from conception to birth. "By depriving the fetus of oxygen, cocaine use threatens fetal development." Because cocaine freely crosses the placental barrier to the fetus and cannot re-circulate back across the placental barrier into the mother's bloodstream, the fetus may become much more severely addicted than the mother. Malformations of urogenital, cardiac and central nervous systems can also result from gestational cocaine abuse. "Neurological problems caused by cocaine can permanently affect motor skills, reflexes and coordination." Cocaine-addicted women experience complications during labor and delivery and deliver infants pre-term (less than 37 weeks gestation). These babies are born with lower birth weights, shorter body lengths, and smaller head circumferences as compared to drug-free babies. Physicians consider these babies to be medically at risk. After birth, the infants experience acute withdrawal from the drug. This withdrawal persists in a sub-acute form for four to six months after birth. As a result of these complications, these infants need intensive medical care estimated to cost approximately $100,000 per infant. A 1992 study estimated that the direct costs related to prenatal drug exposure were $387 million. These figures do not reflect the costs of the long-term effects of prenatal drug exposure. 2. INCARCERATION AS AN ACT OF EARLY INTERVENTION GREATLY REDUCES RISK Fortney, Susan, A Jurisprudential Analysis of Government Intervention and Prenatal Drug Abuse, Journal of Law and Health, 17.1, 2002. Prosecutors and others have articulated a number of reasons that justify government intervention to curb prenatal drug use. The most common reason given is to protect the unborn child of the addicted mother. Presumably, early intervention such as commitment or incarceration might also protect the mother. 3. THE GOVERNMENT HAS TWO STATUTES THAT GIVES IT THE RIGHT TO FORCIBLY INTERVENE Fortney, Susan, A Jurisprudential Analysis of Government Intervention and Prenatal Drug Abuse, Journal of Law and Health, 17.1, 2002. Parens patriae is an ancient doctrine that provides states with limited paternalistic power to protect individuals who lack capacity to act in their own interest. For example, parens patriae authority gives the state the power to enact child abuse laws, to transfer custody of a child from a parent to the state, to order treatment for a viable fetus in utero, and to compel a woman to submit to a caesarian section. In Prince v. Massachusetts the United States Supreme Court recognized that the state's parens patriae authority empowers the state to regulate the family in the public interest. In noting that the state may guard the general interest in the youth's well being, the United States Supreme Court explained that the state has a wide range of power for limiting parental freedom and authority in situations affecting the child's welfare. In addition to parens patriae, states utilize their police power to promote the public welfare and to prevent citizens from harming one another. Speaking of the evils that impede the "healthy, well rounded growth of young people" the United States Supreme Court in Prince stated that legislation appropriately designed to reach such evils is within the state's police power. The state has this authority notwithstanding the parents' claim to control the child.
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PRENATAL DRUG ABUSE IS HEINOUS

1. PRENATAL DRUG ABUSE IS CHILD ABUSE Fortney, Susan, A Jurisprudential Analysis of Government Intervention and Prenatal Drug Abuse, Journal of Law and Health, 17.1, 2002. Prosecutors have attacked maternal substance abuse using different approaches. Between 1985 and 1998 at least 240 women in the United States have been prosecuted for using illegal drugs while pregnant. Generally prosecutors brought cases under existing child abuse and child endangerment laws. Many cases were eventually dismissed because the courts have been "unwilling to stretch criminal child endangerment and child support statutes beyond their most obvious purposes--to protect only already born children ..." The Supreme Courts of Kentucky, Nevada and Ohio have held that a mother cannot be convicted of child abuse or child endangerment for using drugs while pregnant. In contrast to these decisions, the Supreme Court of South Carolina held that South Carolina's child abuse statute protects a viable fetus as a child. In reaching this conclusion, the court interpreted the term "child" to include a viable fetus. Furthermore, the court concluded that its interpretation of the word "person" to include a fetus was consistent with the legislature's intended purpose in enacting the child abuse statute. The two women who were convicted challenged the court's interpretation seeking review by the United States Supreme Court. The Supreme Court refused to hear the case. 2. PRENATAL DRUG ABUSE IS DELIVERY OF DRUGS TO MINORS Fortney, Susan, A Jurisprudential Analysis of Government Intervention and Prenatal Drug Abuse, Journal of Law and Health, 17.1, 2002. Other prosecutions have based cases on laws prohibiting the possession of drugs and the delivery of drugs to minors. One conviction that received national attention was the case of Jennifer Johnson, who was convicted of violating the Florida statute prohibiting delivery of drugs to minors. Such convictions based on existing laws have been challenged on a number of grounds. In allowing these prosecutions, courts are applying to fetuses the state laws intended to protect children. In the absence of clear legislative intent, this amounts to an improper extension of the law. These prosecutions appear to violate the due process requirements of notice and fair warning because they require a novel construction of the law. Arguably, the mothers did not have the requisite notice that their drug use would later be treated as a violation of the drug distribution statutes that are intended to apply to the sale of illegal drugs, not the mere use of illegal drugs. Furthermore, opponents of prosecutions have also asserted equal protection arguments because pregnant women are singled out for prosecution. 6. TREATING PRENATAL DRUG ABUSE AS A CRIMINAL OFFENSE IS POLITICALLY POPULAR Young, Iris Marion, Punishment, Treatment, Empowerment: Three Approaches to Policy for Pregnant Addicts, Feminist Studies, 20.1, 1994. Punitive responses to the problem of drug-exposed infants have significant support among policymakers, law enforcement officials, and the general public. Many prosecutors, judges, and legislatures in the United States have acted on these sentiments. Some judges have sentenced pregnant addicts convicted of crimes like theft or shopliffing to much heavier sentences than they would have otherwise. Punitive legislation regarding pregnant addicts has been considered in more than thirty states and by the U.S. Congress. Although the testimony of legal and medical experts appears to have succeeded in preventing the passage of congressional legislation, at least eight states now include drug exposure in utero in their definition of child abuse and neglect. In several states without such laws, prosecutors have used existing drug-trafficking laws to file criminal charges against women who use cocaine or other controlled substances during pregnancy. By July 1992 at least 167 women in twenty-six states had been arrested and charged criminally because of their use of drugs during pregnancy or because of some other prenatal risk. A number of these women have been found guilty and sentenced to as many as ten years in prison. The majority of these cases have involved women of color, even though white women also use illegal drugs. The controversy that has been boiling about this punishment approach to policy for pregnant addicts appears in some of the appeals of these convictions. As of November 1992, twenty-one cases had been challenged or appealed, and all of these were dismissed or overturned.
33
PUNITIVE MEASURES ARE MILD BUT EFFECTIVE

1. THE PUNISHMENT FITS THE CRIME THE SENTENCE CORRELATES TO THE SEVERITY OF THE DRUG Roberts, Julian V., and Stalans, Loretta J., Public Opinion, Crime and Criminal Justice, 1997, page 56. Another reason for wanting to explore this issue is that judges themselves frequently attempt to reconcile their sentencing practices with the views of the public (or what judges perceive the views of the public to be). If judges believe that a particular crime is now viewed as being less serious than in the past, they are likely to impose less severe sanctions on offenders convicted of this crime. One of the reasons that judges in many western nations have tended to impose lenient sentences on persons convicted of possessing small amounts of "soft" drugs, is that mere possession is no longer regarded as a serious crime by most members of the public. This was probably not the case in the 1950s and 1960s, when drug use was concentrated in a narrowly defined sector of the public, and when many people believed that smoking marijuana would inevitably lead to drug abuse involving "hard" drugs, such as heroin. 2. THE OTHER CRIMES ASSOCIATED WITH DRUG ABUSE ARE RESPONDED TO CORRELATIVELY Roberts, Julian V., and Stalans, Loretta J., Public Opinion, Crime and Criminal Justice, 1997, page 56.
We are also interested in the subject of crime seriousness because criminal justice policy, or more specifically the punishment response focuses on street crimes of violence. The reason for this is that public fear street crimes such as robbery and homicide more than other forms of criminality such as white collar crimes. In this respect, public reaction does not necessarily reflect an objective assessment of the harm to society. Estimates of the magnitude of the problem vary but statistics show that annually approximately 100,000 workers die from accidents and diseases contracted as a result of violations of health and safety codes. The perception that white collar crimes are relatively benign is part of the mythology of crime and criminal justice. It is important, then, to understand public perceptions of the relative harm associated with different forms of criminality.
34

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West Coast Publishing NFL LD Illegal Drugs

NEGATIVE CASE..................................................................................................................................24 NEGATIVE EVIDENCE EXTENSIONS..............................................................................................26

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West Coast Publishing NFL LD Illegal Drugs

West Coast Publishing NFL LD Illegal Drugs

West Coast Publishing NFL LD Illegal Drugs

West Coast Publishing NFL LD Illegal Drugs

West Coast Publishing NFL LD Illegal Drugs

West Coast Publishing NFL LD Illegal Drugs

SECTION 2. RESEARCH GUIDE

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West Coast Publishing NFL LD Illegal Drugs

AFFIRMATIVE SAMPLE CASE

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AFFIRMATIVE EVIDENCE EXTENSIONS

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ILLEGAL DRUGS CAUSE HEALTH CONCERNS AND DEATH

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TREATMENT AND AVOIDING DEATH RATES ARE MOST IMPORTANT

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PUBLIC HEALTH COSTS LESS THAN CRIMINAL JUSTICE

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DRUG ABUSE IS EMPIRICALLY A PUBLIC HEALTH ISSUE

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DRUG TREATMENT FOCUSES ON HEALTH IMPROVEMENT

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ADDICTION MAKES ILLEGAL DRUG ABUSE A HEALTH ISSUE

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DRUG USE IS INEVITABLY A HEALTH ISSUE

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CRIMINAL JUSTICE DOESN'T SOLVE PUBLIC HEALTH

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TREATING DRUG ABUSE AS A MATTER OF PUBLIC HEALTH MAINTAINS FEDERALISM

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TREATING DRUG ABUSE AS PUBLIC HEALTH IS A STATE ISSUE

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West Coast Publishing NFL LD Illegal Drugs

NEGATIVE EVIDENCE EXTENSIONS

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DRUG ABUSE LEADS TO CRIME

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DRUG ABUSE SHOULD BE TREATED BOTH AS HEALTH AND CRIMINAL

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DRUGS SHOULD NOT BE LEGALIZED

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CRIMINAL JUSTICE SOLVES PUBLIC HEALTH CONCERNS

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PRENATAL DRUG ABUSE SHOULD BE A CRIMINAL OFFENSE

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PRENATAL DRUG ABUSE IS HEINOUS

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PUNITIVE MEASURES ARE MILD BUT EFFECTIVE

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