Progress Imminent on 'Mandatory Minimums'?

Wade Henderson, president of the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights (where I was fortunate enough to work last summer), has released an article commenting on the now famous comment from Senator Sessions that he wanted to "do that crack thing" with Senator Leahy and Mr. Henderson.

Whilst Sessions' comment was a slip of the tongue rather than an indication of any serious problem, the point he was alluding to is a rather serious one: that of mandatory minimum sentences for crack cocaine in the United States. As Henderson describes the problem,

"Defendants convicted with just 5 grams of crack cocaine — enough to yield only about 10 to 50 doses and weighing less than two packets of sugar — are subject to a five-year mandatory minimum sentence. But when it comes to powder cocaine, you have to be caught trying to sell 100 times as much — 500 grams, which yields between 2,500 and 5,000 doses — to be subject to the same mandatory minimum of five years."

Due to mandatory minimum sentences, the average sentence for first time offenders is now 10 years and 6 months in prison. This is 59% longer than the average prison sentence received by convicted rapists and only 18% less than the average sentence received by those convicted of manslaughter or murder.

For many, this absurd policy is rooted in a new form of racism. Though only 13% of drug users in the United States are black, they comprise 38% of those arrested for (and 59% of those sentenced for) drug offences and this is in no small part down to mandatory minimum sentences. The majority of crack cocaine users are black, whilst the majority of powder cocaine users are white. Mandatory minimums ensure that the majority of people who are arrested and sentenced for drug offenses are black.

That the most senior Republican on the Senate Judiciary Committee is advocating reform on this issue is proof enough of the failure of mandatory minimums to solve America's drug problems. More importantly, his support may be enough to encourage other Republicans of this, and enable America to rid itself of this racist policy once and for all.

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