Tag Archives: abolition

Legalize Marijuana and Abolish Cash Bail for Nonviolent Offenders

Politics, Uncategorized, , , , , ,

I read once that we’re living in the “justice reform era”. Marijuana legalization seems to be the landmark product of this era.

However, the news coming from post-legalization states is that, for its suspension of much of a local theatre of the long War on Drugs, the poor of color are not the biggest beneficiaries of this regime change.

What we do know, so far, is that white people, Latinos and homeowners are the biggest beneficiaries of marijuana legalization at the state level, especially in California. Black people who use weed while within or near their residence run a higher risk of offending the terms of their lease with their possession of weed, especially those who live in federally-funded housing.

So how do we mitigate the impact of “smoking weed while black”? One way is to abolish cash bail for those accused of nonviolent offenses, like using marijuana.

Imagine marijuana-legal California abolishing cash bail. Being the biggest state that would do so, those who are arrested for nonviolently offending the remaining state-level marijuana laws (among other laws) can be released quickly from jail on their own cognizance so that they don’t lose their jobs, homes, cars, or other life needs. Poor people of color, including those who use legal amounts of marijuana, would be major beneficiaries of abolishing cash bail and related pre-trial expenses.

Ending this financially-oppressive practice for all accused nonviolent offenders can make California a more economically-fair place to both live and use weed for poor people of color.

Maybe this can be encapsulated as a “pro-forgiveness” agenda, in which those who, by indirect way of an authority figure’s perception of a person’s unchangeable background or features, receive more disproportionate punishment for crimes or offenses which are committed at the same rate by all suspect classes can receive effective amnesty and expunging of their records.

With legal weed (in California as of this year), restrictions on civil asset forfeiture (already passed in California in 2016), the shifting of many felonies to misdemeanors (already passed) and cash bail abolition for nonviolent offenders (yet to be passed), we will see greater economic mobility for the poor of color.

I can’t wait to see both marijuana and cash bail reform happen in the same state.

I wonder if there are any books on, or books set in, the African-American community in Boston prior to the Civil War. When slavery was abolished in Massachusetts in 1783 by the Supreme Judicial Court, it took effect immediately rather than the gradual, generational abolition which had been authorized in Pennsylvania and other surrounding states. The Boston African-American community was the largest in the United States to enter the 19th century entirely as legal free people.

Of course Boston is known for being a center of abolitionist sentiment before New York City became the primary metropolitan community of free Africans in North America after 1827. But I’m pretty sure that there is a lot more to the history of the Boston community in the period between 1783 and 1827 beyond the abolition movement. What were the relationships, the cultural expressions, the institutions, the social class structures, the political advancements which developed so early among this early-free community?