Marijuana has been illegal on a federal level in the United States since 1937, but recently in several states across the U.S. has become legal, so what are lawmakers doing about the many people in prisons who are still serving a sentence for misdemeanor marijuana possession? In Seattle since around 2010 minor drug charges involving marijuana have been in a way ignored by criminal prosecutors because of the lax idea of it by the local lawmakers. In 2012 marijuana was legalized in Washington state, so laws about possession of the substance were reduced saying that a person who is at least 21 years of age may possess around 16 ounces of marijuana in a non-liquid form. So if this much marijuana is now legal to possess, why are people still in jails in Washington for charges of possession for less than the now legal amount? This is what Seattle was working on in the middle of 2018, the people of Seattle believed that it was unfair for people convicted to still have to serve sentences for something that is now legal all around the state. The Seattle lawmakers in doing this will release thousands of people from jail who are serving time for these types of crime and this article in the Seattle Times hopes that this gesture will help mend the relationship of Seattle and those who were affected by the huge crackdowns on drugs during the height of Washington’s ‘War on Drugs.’
This article is really important to the entirety of the U.S. society because it is redefining the perceived deviance of marijuana users and distributors. One of the biggest things the Seattle government is doing is making up for the war on drugs that took over Seattle for several decades. This is important to society because it’s recognizing that the war on drugs had a negative impact on society and there were consequences that now need to be remedied. The war on drugs in Seattle, as well as the whole of the U.S., had large and lasting negative effects mainly on POC, more specifically black Americans. Laws like stop and frisk in places like New York were largely racially based to try and arrest and charge as many people as possible for drug possession. The Seattle Times in this article addresses that there was/still is a large racial issue with drug arrests because POC were targeted more by the majority white police force who were essentially told that the easiest targets and the easiest busts were with people of color. The movement to vacate prisoners with these types of drug charges is a good start for Seattle, but does it make up for the large scale racist agenda police forces had during the height of the ‘war on drugs’?
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Brenna Sociology 107 