Drug Policy Harms Youth

Marisa Garcia was a senior in high school that fateful night when she was stopped by the police near her California home. Her car was inspected, and a small pipe containing marijuana resin was found. Garcia received a ticket for marijuana possession, went to court, paid a $400 fine, and thought the matter was finished. She was wrong.

Some months later, her application for financial aid from the California State University system was sent back to her because she inadvertently failed to answer the infamous Question 35, which asks whether or not an applicant has ever been convicted of possessing or selling drugs other than tobacco or alcohol. Garcia immediately contacted the financial aid office and, thinking little of it, told them of her minor transgression involving the ashes of a cannabis plant.

Yet, thanks to a provision Congress inserted into the Higher Education Act (HEA) when it was reauthorized in 1998, the financial aid office promptly replied that she was no longer eligible for money. Marisa Garcia, who until that moment had every reason in the world to expect a bright, college-bound future, was devastated that she would not have enough money to attend the following fall. Marisa was not alone. In the 2001-2002 school year around 43,000 students were denied federal aid because of their response to Question 35; many of those denials were for possession of small amounts of marijuana.

These young people are the victims of the Drug Free Student Loans Provision of the Higher Education Act. This law denies all forms of federal financial aid to any student who has been convicted of possessing or selling illegal substances. Conviction of possession carries with it a one-year ineligibility period for a first offense, two-years for a second, and indefinite ineligibility for subsequent offenses. Sale of a drug entails two years of ineligibility for a first offense, and indefinite ineligibility for subsequent offenses.

The law provides the option of reducing the ineligibility period by completing a drug rehabilitation program. Like many of the victims, Garcia looked into drug rehab programs only to find that public ones had long waiting lines—the Office of National Drug Control Policy allocates less than 15 percent of its budget to treatment—and private ones were prohibitively expensive, six-month live-in programs. If these young people are already without the means to attend college, what incentive do they have to spend their meager savings on rehab—especially when most of them don’t think they have a drug problem? After all, if the government forced everyone who had ever smoked marijuana to pay for rehabilitation, over 70 million Americans would have to break out their checkbooks.

After postponing her life for a year, Marisa again became eligible for aid and did end up attending Cal State, Fullerton. Unfortunately, however, Marisa’s case is far from the norm; on the contrary, many young people from low-income families, instead of applying to college a second time, enter the workforce at minimum pay and remain there for life, simply because their families need immediate sources of income. It is these young people who are marginalized so that the politicians on Capitol Hill can ensure hard-working Americans that their tax dollars won’t be spent on “druggies.” To justify this harsh treatment of America’s youth, drug warriors transform the problem into one of personal responsibility. They argue that it’s not the government’s fault these people did not choose to apply to school again. While there is much to be said for reinstating personal responsibility as a value in this country, such arguments drastically miss the point: shouldn’t the government at the very least not discourage working class youth from attending college?

Yet, to say that our politicians simply don’t realize the harm done by the law would be naive. The reason why this law remains on the books has nothing to do with ambiguity over its injustice or inefficiency. The Drug Free Student Loans Provision is patently and undeniably unjust because it closes the doors of higher education to only low-income students and does nothing to solve our nation’s drug problem. Worst of all, it removes the power judges previously had to deny federal aid to students on a case-by-case basis, which allowed for punishment that more appropriately fit the crime. If the United States government was truly concerned with protecting America’s youth and discouraging harmful behavior, it would do something about the four students who die, the 1,370 who are injured, and the 192 who are raped or sexually assaulted on college campuses every single day from incidents involving not marijuana, but alcohol.

To be sure, the Drug Free Student Loans Provision remains law not because its injustice is debatable, but rather because of the quagmire into which debate over drug policy has sunk. Rhetoric has eclipsed logic as politicians come down with an iron fist knowing that it will win them votes, even though they also know that a war on drug users wastes billions of dollars each year and turns hundreds of thousands of Americans into criminals when, if anything, they ought to be helped, not jailed or denied access to education.

A few courageous souls have spoken out against approaching drug policy as a war on American citizens. Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.) has sponsored a bill that would strike the Drug Free Student Loans Provision. His bill garnered over 60 co-sponsors in the last session of congress. Thus far, over seventy student governments and national organizations have come out against the law and in support of Frank’s bill. Last year, Yale became the fourth college that guarantees to reimburse students for any federal aid lost due to Question 35. These and other acts have put pressure on politicians in Washington to confront the injustice of the HEA drug provision. These efforts must continue. We citizens must not become as complacent as our politicians, whether in regard to this particular law, drug policy, or national issues in general; the essence of democracy is at stake. In such times, when the burden to do what is right falls upon the people because their representatives have failed, knowledgeable citizens have a duty to inform others.

Despite the fact that Harvard’s financial aid office counteracts the HEA drug provision by guaranteeing that all accepted students will have their need met, the University administration, as a model for other institutions, must openly decry this unjust law. To this end, the Undergraduate Council will be considering a resolution this upcoming Sunday, Feb. 16, that asks President Summers and the Financial Aid Office publicly condemn the Drug Free Student Loans Provision of the Higher Education Act. I urge concerned students to show their support by attending the meeting and stating their fervent desire to end this injustice.

Thomas J. Scaramellino ’04 is a social studies concentrator in Dunster House. He is the president of The Harvard Coalition for Drug Policy Reform.