Edward R. Becker Quotes

We cannot arrest our way out of the drug problem.

We have lost the War on Drugs. We cannot arrest our way out of it….It’s a public health problem, not a crime problem.

The war on drugs is a war on our own families …. We have to move from a system that punishes to a system that treats.

Previously people were treated anonymously particular on a drugs situation which is obviously highly emotive. They have been treated anonymously even after the verdict had been reached.

Tough on crime, tough on the causes of crime.

I would equate the legalization of drugs to the moral equivalent of genocide.

The Drug War is probably the worst scourge that has ever been visited upon this country.

The society focuses on the addict, and its impact on our quality of life, but we don't focus on people who are rehabilitated and in recovery.

The real drug "kingpin" is the user. It is the casual users who create the profits. But we can't put them all in prison; there isn't any room in the jails.

There is absolutely no difference between alcohol prohibition and drug prohibition except the drug being prohibited.

For all our policing, we understand that law enforcement is not the solution to the problem of drugs in our society.

Should someone go to jail for just doing drugs? I believe the time has come for that to end.

Addiction, once developed, is a very chronic condition. It is admitted by the authorities, including the narcotics commissioner, that very few "cures" result from incarceration .... The idea of incarcerating even a hundred thousand, let alone a million, unfortunates for a term of five years is rather startling—especially considering that they are sick people, for the most part of average respectability and moral status, not markedly handicapped by their infirmity.

For 40 years we have been looking for ways to make the existence of the narcotic drug addict just as tough as possible. For 40 years we have asked only what new penalties, what new police tech-niques, might make it easier to catch him and lock him up, whether as an ordinary criminal or, more recently, in connection with some more or less sincere efforts at rehabilitation in confinement. I believe that this entire approach is open to grave question as a practical matter

The consumption of drugs could be legalized, not penalized.

Incarcerating people for their [drug] consumption choices has the consistency of arresting a survivor of suicide for attempted murder.

The criminal justice system is not the right place - or it shouldn't be the place of first resort to provide addiction or mental health services. It should happen elsewhere with no police and no judges and no juries and no jails.

Drugs are a tragedy for addicts. But criminalizing their use converts that tragedy into a disaster for society, for users and non-users alike. Our experience with the prohibition of drugs is a replay of our experience with the prohibition of alcoholic beverages.

The war on meth must be fought with a multi-pronged approach.

By bringing about a rational drug policy, we'd be freeing up a lot of resources for real crime. Drug disputes would get played out with courts rather than with guns. So it would make this country a much better place overnight.

With random urinalysis, there's a clear choice - either get high or go to jail.

Drug education is the only vaccine we have against the danger of drug abuse of our children.

We know the war on drugs will not be won in Washington DC When the United States of America decides it wants to do something and the people pull together, amazing things can be done.

To become a narcotic addict is an anti-social act and the foundation of countermeasures against addiction is to treat and rehabilitate addicts.

The drug problem in this country is a consumption issue.