The Resolution
INTRODUCTION TO THE RESOLUTION
On February 26, 1993 a group of concerned citizens met at the Hoover Institution on the campus of Stanford University and unanimously passed a resolution which recommends that our country investigate the possibility of change in the way we handle our drug problems. The Resolution, which recommends that these medical and social problems be treated with medical and social solutions, is attached hereto. As you can see, it further recommends that one final Blue Ribbon Commission be immediately empowered by the President to recommend revisions of the drug laws of these United States to reduce the harm caused by these drug problems. The original signers of the Resolution are as follows:
Dr. Milton Friedman
Nobel laureate; Professor Emeritus of Economics, University of Chicago; Senior Research Fellow, Hoover Institution, Stanford, CA
Dr. Joseph D. McNamara
Former Chief of Police, San Jose, CA, and Kansas City, MO; Fellow, Hoover Institution, Stanford, CA
Herbert Berger, M.D.
F.A.C.P.; F.C.C.P.; Internationally recognized authority on drug treatment, Staten Island, NY
Judge James P. Gray
Orange County Superior Court, Santa Ana, CA
Katherine H. Smith
Founder, Group Resolving Anti-Social Problems (GRASP), Anaheim, CA
S. Clarke Smith, M.D.
F.A.A.F.P.; Board of Directors, California Academy of Family Physicians, Anaheim, CA
Clifford A. Schaffer
Author; Computer Consultant, Canyon Country, CA
Frederick H. Meyers, M.D.
Professor of Pharmacology, University of California at San Francisco; Chairman of the California Research Advisory Panel on Drugs
Harvey L. Rose, M.D.
Author of California’s “Intractable Pain Treatment Act;” Family Practice, Carmichael, CA
John J. McCarthy, M.D., A.B.P.N.
Psychiatrist, Executive Director, Bi-Valley Medical Clinic, Sacramento, CA
Gary Davis, M.D.
Diplomate in Psychiatry, A.B.P.N., American Board of Psychiatry & Neurology, Citrus Heights, CA
Benson B. Roe, M.D.
Professor and Chief Emeritus of Cardiothoracic Surgery, University of California at San Francisco, CA
Stephen A. Fisher, M.D.
Diplomate in Psychiatry, A.B.P.N., American Board of Psychiatry & Neurology, Berkeley, CA
Reverend Leonard B. Jackson
First A.M.E. Church of Los Angeles, CA
Reverend J. D. Moore
First A.M.E. Church of Los Angeles, CA
Donald McNamara
Investment Consultant, New York, NY
Richard Arthur
Educator, Former Principal of Castlemont High School, Oakland, CA; Author of Gangs and Schools, Richmond, CA
Howard Levine
Office of the Mayor, Baltimore, MD
* Kurt L. Schmoke
Mayor, City of Baltimore, Maryland
* George P. Shultz
Former United States Secretary of State, Hoover Institution, Stanford, CA
* Unable to attent due to prior commitments
Feel free to fill out the Resolution form below and JudgeJimGray.com will submit your resolution on your behalf. You can also download the form and print it and later mail it at your convience. To download the Resolution go to the bottom of this Resolution page.
RESOLUTION
Whereas, the overall situation regarding the use of drugs in our society and the crime and misery that accompany it has continued to deteriorate for several decades; and
Whereas, our society has continued to attempt, at enormous financial cost and loss of civil liberties, to resolve drug abuse problems through the criminal justice system, with the accompanying increase of prisons and numbers of inmates; and
Whereas, the huge untaxed revenues generated by the illicit drug trade are undermining legitimate governments world-wide; and
Whereas, the present system has spawned a cycle of hostility by the incarceration of disproportionate numbers of African-Americans, Hispanics, and other minority groups; and
Whereas, the number of people who have contracted AIDS, hepatitis, and other diseases from contaminated hypodermic needles is epidemic under our present system; and
Whereas, in our society’s zeal to pursue our criminal approach, legitimate medical uses for the relief of pain and suffering of patients have been suppressed;
Therefore be it resolved that our society must recognize drug use and abuse as the medical and social problems that they are, and that they must be treated with medical and social solutions; and
Further be it resolved that an objective commission be immediately empowered by the President and by Congress to recommend revisions of the drug laws of these United States in order to reduce the harm our current policies are causing.
Thank you! With your help, our country will establish this Blue Ribbon Commission, and then begin to pursue options that will reduce the harms that are caused by the presence of these sometimes dangerous and addicting drugs in our communities.