Crack cocaine and race relations
Crack cocaine, a freebase form of cocaine that became prevalent in the 1980s, is a powerful stimulant known for producing an intense high and is significantly cheaper than powdered cocaine. The rise of crack cocaine is intertwined with complex race relations and criminal justice issues in the United States. Critics argue that enforcement of drug laws has disproportionately targeted minority communities, particularly African Americans and Latinos, while allowing major traffickers to evade punishment. The Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1986 established a stark sentencing disparity, mandating much harsher penalties for crack cocaine possession compared to powdered cocaine, which has historically been favored by White users. This discrepancy has led to a predominance of minority defendants in federal crack cases, raising concerns about systemic racial bias.
Allegations have also emerged suggesting that drug trafficking was intentionally introduced into minority neighborhoods as a form of oppression, a notion supported by various community leaders and activists. While investigations have largely found no direct governmental conspiracy, the perception of a racial bias in drug enforcement remains prevalent. In recent years, legislative reforms, such as the Fair Sentencing Act of 2010 and the First Steps Act of 2018, have sought to address these disparities, yet advocates continue to highlight ongoing inequalities in the criminal justice system related to crack cocaine policies. The historical and ongoing discourse surrounding crack cocaine and race reflects deeper societal issues that continue to impact American communities.
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Crack cocaine and race relations
Crack cocaine, also known as freebase, rock, french fries, and ready rock, is a drug made by chemically removing the hydrochloride base of cocaine hydrochloride (a white powder which its users snort) with highly dangerous solvents, thus producing cocaine free of its base, or freebase (a paste that is smoked). Crack cocaine, so called because it makes a cracking sound when it is heated for smoking, can also be made less dangerously by heating cocaine hydrochloride with ammonia or baking soda, which also removes the base and produces a hard paste that resembles rock salt. Introduced in the 1970’s and commonly used by the 1980’s, crack became popular both because it produced a more intense high than regular cocaine and was much cheaper.
The question of whether crime and race or ethnicity are related to discrimination against African Americans and Latinos in the U.S. criminal justice system’s War on Drugs and specifically in the campaign against crack cocaine arises on several fronts. Critics claim that enforcement generally targets minority communities and their inhabitants while allowing the major traffickers from the outside to go largely unpunished. More particularly, critics assert that laws dealing with powder cocaine, which is favored by Whites, tend to be more lenient, whereas legislation concerning crack cocaine, preferred by some minorities, is apt to be harsher. In 1986, Congress passed the Anti-Drug Abuse Act which required a minimum five-year sentence without parole for the possession of five grams of crack. In contrast, the minimum five-year sentence for cocaine at that time was in effect for possession of five hundred grams, creating a 100-to-1 ratio. Moreover, since 1986, minorities comprised more than 97 percent of all crack defendants in federal courts, where severe sentences predominate, whereas typically Whites arrested for crack violations, being able to afford legal counsel, ended up in state courts, which characteristically handed down more moderate punishments. More radical critics further charge that drugs—as well as acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS) and guns—are being foisted on minority communities to kill them off. The 1991 film Boyz ’n’ the Hood was a prime illustration of such an argument.
That depiction acquired further credibility with the publication of San Jose Mercury News reporter Gary Webb’s “Dark Alliance” series in August of 1996, which strongly suggested that Nicaraguan drug dealers had plied their crack cocaine trade in South Central Los Angeles in order to finance the Contras, who were fighting the leftist government of Daniel Ortega. Moreover, the U.S. government, especially the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), was fully aware of such trafficking but did nothing, since the U.S. government also supported the Contra cause. Declassified documents show that Oliver North, an aide in the National Security Council during the Reagan administration, knew of the ties. The Reverend Jesse Jackson, political activist Dick Gregory, and congresswoman Maxine Waters reflected prominent black opinion, which found these judgments not only plausible but accurate as well. Waters said that “People in high places[knew] about it, winking, blinking, and in South Central Los Angeles, our children were dying.”
Replies to these allegations came in the form of editorials, investigations by Congress and the administration of President Bill Clinton, and court decisions. San Jose Mercury Newsexecutive editor Jerry Ceppos admitted that there were “shortcomings” in Webb’s articles, and this conclusion was echoed by such newspapers as The New York Times, The Washington Post, and the Los Angeles Times. The Justice Department and the CIA inspector general both undertook investigations of the assertion that the CIA had participated in such drug trafficking, either directly or indirectly, and concluded that the agency had not done so. The House Intelligence Committee also investigated the question and found no connection. The case is not thereby closed, but until evidence can be introduced to make a connection between Nicaraguan drug dealers and the CIA, in regard to the Iran-Contra Scandal, it will remain a weighty issue, particularly in African American communities. In any event, the fact that there are those who see crack cocaine as a conspiracy of a dominant group against people of color underscores the state of racial and ethnic relations in many communities in the United States.
As for the charge that Blacks and other minorities are unfairly singled out for drug infractions and subject to harsher penalties, the Supreme Court in 1996 ruled that African Americans had not been targeted for drug prosecution in crack cocaine cases. However, an editorial that appeared in the May 15, 1997, issue of the Los Angeles Times (p. B-8) opined: “Putting aside the defendants’ race, the blatant inequality exercised under these[federal] laws now looms large, seen by all but acknowledged by few.” In 2010, this changed as Congress acknowledged the inequality in sentencing for offenses relating to crack by passing the Fair Sentencing Act (FSA). The act changed statutory penalties for crack cocaine offenses, changing the 100-to-1 ratio to an 18-to-1 ratio for sentencing. The FSA also eliminated mandatory minimum sentences for possession of crack cocaine. Further changes occurred in 2018 with the signing of the First Steps Act. One of the noteworthy parts of this act was that it made the 18-to-1 ratio of the FSA retroactive, attempting to address the punitive measures of the 1980s and 1990s. Data from the program showed promising results, with prison populations decreasing from 2019 to 2020. Nonetheless, criminal justice and social justice advocates still argue the racial disparities in relation to drug offenses and crack cocaine policies.
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