National Civil Rights Campaign to Save our Children, Families and Communities from Draconian Laws and Mass- Incarceration

WHEREAS, our children represent the continuity of our collective existence and the source of our immortality; and

WHEREAS, the birth, rearing and protection of our children is the primary objective and central focus of our families; and

WHEREAS, the family is historically and traditionally the epicenter of African American strength and culture; and

WHEREAS, the right to maintain family integrity and control over the rearing of children is a paramount civil and constitutional right; and

WHEREAS, American civil rights promises all Americans, regardless of race, creed, or national origin, the right to freedom and liberty and protection from laws that, in application have a disparate impact on members of one particular race or ethnicity; and

WHEREAS, the United States Congress and the President of the United States enacted Public Law 98-473, also known as the Comprehensive Crime Control Act of 1984, one of the most far-reaching series of changes on the federal criminal justice system ever enacted at one time; and

WHEREAS, the bail reform provisions of the Comprehensive Crime Control Act of 1984 have made bail virtually unattainable to African Americans and other poor and minority defendants who are presumed innocent and which provisions have caused numerous defendants to accept plea agreements made under duress, without regard to guilt, in order to be removed from county jails which are no more than de facto concentration camps; and

WHEREAS, the forfeiture provisions of the Comprehensive Crime Control Act of 1984 has also had a disparate impact on African Americans and other racial and ethnic minority Americans; and

WHEREAS, the sentencing reform provisions of the Comprehensive Crime Control Act of 1984 have been used, in African American and other racial and ethnic minority communities to create a network of inherently unreliable, paid informants who have been utilized to turn family against family and de-stabilize entire communities; and

WHEREAS, the United States Congress and the President of the United States have enacted Public Law 99-570, also known as the Anti-Drug Act of 1986 which established a one hundred to one ratio in the sentencing requirements for cocaine hydrochloride and cocaine-based offenses; and

WHEREAS, the result of the one hundred to one ratio has been the establishment of penalties for possession of small amounts of cocaine base that are unprecedented in the annals of American criminal justice and which penalties may only be accurately described as draconian; and

WHEREAS, there is no molecular difference in cocaine hydrochloride and cocaine base; and

WHEREAS, even during debate of the Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1986 the racial disparities were predicted as Congressman Clay Shaw said that it would "save minority neighborhoods all over the country;" and

WHEREAS, the Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1986 was specifically intended to set prohibited amounts of cocaine-base, also known as "crack" cocaine, so low as to "qualify users as dealers;" and

WHEREAS, the result of the enactment of the aforementioned public laws has been the wholesale interference with the constitutionally guaranteed rights of ethnic minority Americans to travel and hold property and be free of unreasonable searches and seizures; and

WHEREAS, the aforementioned public laws have had a dramatic disparate impact on African Americans and Hispanic American men, women and children; and

WHEREAS, as a result of the aforementioned laws has been the mass incarceration of African American and Hispanic American men, women and children; and

WHEREAS, as a result of the aforementioned laws, the rate of incarceration of African Americans for non-violent crimes is 4,819 per 1,000,000 while that for white Americans is 649 per 100,000; and

WHEREAS, 12% of African American men between the ages of 20 and 34 are presently incarcerated; and

WHEREAS, there are more African American men in prison than in college; and

WHEREAS, the percentage of African American men in prison and jail in the United States is more than five (5) times the rate at which African American men were imprisoned in South Africa at the height of the racist apartheid system; and

WHEREAS, the percentage increase in the incarceration rates for African American women annually exceeds that for African American men; and

WHEREAS, the overwhelming majority of incarcerated African American women have children under the age of 18; and

WHEREAS, the rates of surveillance, investigation, arrest, prosecution and incarceration as adults of African American juveniles are much greater than those of their white counterparts; and

WHEREAS, three out of four juveniles are admitted to adult prisons are African American or a racial or ethnic minority; and

WHEREAS, the wanton disparities against African Americans and other racial and ethnic minority Americans that have already been mentioned are the direct result of the aforementioned public laws, which were enacted specifically to implement the so-called "war on drugs;" and

WHEREAS, the United States Supreme Court has held that "though the law itself may be fair on its face and impartial in appearance, yet if it is applied and administered by pubic authority with an evil eye and an unequal hand, so as to practically make an unjust and illegal discrimination between persons in similar circumstances, material to their rights, the denial of equal justice is still within the prohibition of the Constitution;" and

WHEREAS, the United States Supreme Court has also held that when the original enactment of a statue is "motivated by a desire to discriminate against blacks on account of their race, it violates Equal Protections;" and

WHEREAS, NAACP President and CEO, Kweisi Mfume has noted that in 1993, 88.3% of federal crack cocaine trafficking convictions were by African Americans and that such statistics raise a "strong inference of invidious discrimination;" and

WHEREAS, Congresswoman Maxine Waters has stated that "(W)e believe there is a conspiracy against our children and against our communities and that our children are targeted;" and

WHEREAS, at least one Congressperson has publicly questioned whether "there is a conspiracy among the majority to incarcerate as many African American males as possible;" and

WHEREAS, the NAACP has found that the one hundred to one ratio for cocaine hydrochloride and cocaine-based is "not medically, scientifically or socially supportable and unfairly burden(s) the African American community;" and

WHEREAS, the NAACP has concluded that the "War on Drugs" has been disproportionately targeted at inner-city black communities;" and

WHEREAS, the NAACP has concluded that "if legislation and "sentencing" guidelines were changed... the black/white difference in sentences for cocaine trafficking would not only evaporate, but would slightly reverse;" and

WHEREAS, the NAACP has found that the evidence is "overwhelming" that the criminal justice system often unfairly targets African Americans and their communities for surveillance, investigation, prosecution and harassment;" and

WHEREAS, the NAACP has found that "the 1986 Act was expedited through Congress" and that the "Congress dispensed with most of the typical legislative process, including committee analysis of the Act's provisions," and that Congress composed the "troubling" one hundred to one ratio in thirty (30) days;" and

WHEREAS, the NAACP has determined that the 100 to 1 ratio is "unfair, irrational and has a significant discriminatory impart on African Americans;" and

WHEREAS, the United States Sentencing Commission, on May 1, 1995, transmitted to Congress an amendment to the sentencing guidelines to abolish the one hundred to one disparity and to equalize the statutory penalties having found, after careful study, no justification for the disparity; and

WHEREAS, the United States Sentencing Commission also submitted to Congress, on the same day, proposed legislation ("The Cocaine Penalty Adjustment Act of 1995") to harmonize the crack penalty statutes with the proposed guidelines amendment; and

WHEREAS, the United States Congress, for the first time in its history, rejected the guidelines' amendment and proposed legislation; and

WHEREAS, no change in the law has been forthcoming in the more than eight (8) years since the guidelines amendment and proposed legislation were rejected by the United States Congress; and

WHEREAS, African Americans and other racial and ethnic minorities continue to be incarcerated under the longest sentences in the history of American criminal justice; and

WHEREAS, more than one million African Americans are imprisoned in the United States and another two million are under some form of criminal justice supervision; and

WHEREAS, the decimation of African American families and their communities continues unabated; and

WHEREAS, no community can long survive when its men, women and children suffer under the impact of laws which disparately target their communities and result in mass incarceration; and

WHEREAS, convicted felons have limitations or obstructions placed on their rights to vote in nearly every state of the United States; and

WHEREAS, by reason of the denial of the right to vote, such persons are unable to effect change of the law through the conventional means of the ballot; and

WHEREAS, criminal justice reform is unequivocally and undeniably a civil rights issue; and

WHEREAS, the NAACP is the preeminent civil rights organization in the United States, if not the world; and

WHEREAS, one of the stated and longstanding missions of the NAACP is to fight racially discriminatory legislation and to seek repeal of such legislation.

THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED, that the NAACP launch a national multi-media campaign to "Save our Children, Families and Communities" by publicly demanding the repeal of draconian provisions in the Comprehensive Crime Control Act of 1984, the Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1986 and other public laws which undercut American principles of innocence until proven guilty by making bail virtually unattainable to racial and ethnic minorities and the poor; and

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that the NAACP support the repeal of provisions in the Comprehensive Crime Control Act of 1984, the Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1986 and other laws which allow for asset forfeiture which unfairly penalize the innocent and family members not included in accused crimes and in some cases even serve as nothing more than a scam in some jurisdictions to confiscate, hold and profit from property and cash money; and

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that the NAACP support the repeal of provisions in the Comprehensive Crime Control Act of 1984, the Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1986 and other laws that result in the unfair implementation of sentencing disparities in our drug enforcement laws which arbitrarily and intentionally target the poor and more harshly the citizens of little financial means; and

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that the NAACP support the repeal of provisions in the Comprehensive Crime Control Act of 1984, the Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1986 and other laws that create or maintain mandatory minimum sentences and effectively eviscerate much needed judicial discretion; and

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that the NAACP support the repeal of provisions in the Comprehensive Crime Control Act of 1984, the Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1986 and other laws that institute unfair, biased and unreasonable search and seizure procedures; and

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that the NAACP support the repeal of provisions in the Comprehensive Crime Control Act of 1984, the Anti-Drug Act of 1986 and other laws that allow and promote surveillance practices that unnecessarily intrude on the right to privacy as intended in our nation's Bill of Rights; and

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that the NAACP support the repeal of provisions in the Comprehensive Crime Control Act of 1984, the Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1986 and other laws that do not allow more alternatives to incarceration such as community based drug treatment program and community service; and

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that the NAACP support the repeal of provisions in the Comprehensive Crime Control Act of 1984, the Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1986 and other laws that allow the transfer of any juveniles to adult courts; or the placement of any juveniles into adult prison facilities; and

BE IT FINALLY RESOLVED, that the NAACP support the repeal of provisions in the Comprehensive Crime Control Act of 1984, the Anti-Drug Abuse Act of 1986 and other laws that create drug-related guidelines that supersede the guidelines recommended by the United States Sentencing Commission.