Only one way to eliminate drug-war Violence

By JACOB G. HORNBERGER

From U.S. Congressman Henry Cuellar, to the DEA, to the FBI, to the Webb County sheriff's office, to the Laredo Police Department, to Laredo Mayor Betty Flores, everyone is expressing concern about drug-war violence in Nuevo Laredo .

Unfortunately, however, the remedy being proposed is the same old tired one that Laredoans have been hearing for some 30 years -- crack down even more fiercely in the war on drugs, especially on drug sellers.

What all these politicians and law-enforcement people fail to recognize is that the drug war itself is the cause of the violence they seek to eliminate and that “cracking down” will only exacerbate the problem.

In 1975, I returned to Laredo , where I had grown up, to practice law. At that time, as today, Laredo was one of the nation's major drug-entry points, and in fact, my first jury trial was a drug-possession case in federal district court. Not surprisingly, the federal prosecutor and the DEA agents were as dedicated and devoted to fighting the war on drugs as their successors 30 years later.

Undoubtedly many of the drug agents in the 1970s are now retired and collecting nice government pensions. One thing is for sure: the war they were waging on drugs and drug dealers is nowhere close to being “won,” and in fact many of the same “we're making progress” bromides we heard 30 years ago are repeated by their successors today.

The reason that the drug war will never rid Laredo , Nuevo Laredo , or anywhere else of drug-related violence is very simple: The drug war itself gives rise to the violent drug lords it aims to eradicate.

This phenomenon revolves around the laws of supply and demand, laws that all too many politicians think they have the power to repeal.

When anything is made illegal, ordinary businesses must stop producing and selling it, but that doesn't mean that the item disappears from the marketplace. Immediately, a black market in the item materializes. That's what happened when the government made drugs illegal to possess and distribute.

Over the years, the government has made every effort to stamp out the black market in drugs, but the results have been exactly the opposite of what has been intended. With each new drug-war crackdown, the supply of drugs has been restricted, which has meant ever-increasing black-market profits.

The higher profits have attracted ever-more unsavory people into the drug business, the type of people willing to commit any act of violence or corrupt any number of government officials in an attempt to gain a bigger market share of the illegal drug business.

That's why the results of the drug war are no different from the results of Prohibition, when federal officials waged their famous war on alcohol, one of the most destructive drugs of all.

Is there a way to eliminate drug lords, drug gangs and drug-related violence? Yes, but the solution is one that so far only a few politicians and law-enforcements agents are willing to embrace. As the Nobel Prize-winning economist Milton Friedman pointed out decades ago, the solution is simply to end the war on drugs, which means re-legalizing the drugs that are now criminal to possess or distribute. Just as violent booze lords were immediately put out of business with the end of Prohibition, violent drug lords would be immediately put out of business with the end of drug prohibition.

There's no other way to cure drug-related violence. Those who want to end the violence without ending the drug war are hoping for rain without clouds.

Ultimately, however, the drug war presents a moral issue, especially on the demand side: Why should government have the power to punish a person for ingesting a harmful substance, be it cocaine, marijuana, whiskey or tobacco? Indeed, I still remember the friends of mine in Laredo whose lives were damaged not so much by the drugs they were ingesting but by the federal conviction they received when they were caught.

The drug war has been waged long enough and without success and has damaged or destroyed enough lives. If Laredoans and the rest of the world want to restore peace and tranquility to their societies, there is only one solution: End the drug war.

( Jacob G. Hornberger is a 1968 graduate of Nixon High School and is founder and president of The Future of Freedom Foundation in Fairfax, Va., www.fff.org .)