Yale Bulletin and Calendar

November 9, 2001

Volume 30, Number 10

DEA official and New Mexico's
governor to discuss war on drugs

he Yale Law School Federalist Society will host a debate between Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) Administrator Asa Hutchinson and New Mexico Governor Gary Johnson on Thursday, Nov. 15.

Titled "The War on Drugs: Its Past, Present and Future," the debate will begin at 8 p.m. in the Levinson Auditorium in the Sterling Law Buildings, 127 Wall St. The event is free and open to the public.

Despite their common political backgrounds as conservative Republicans, Hutchinson and Johnson have divergent views on the war on drugs. Hutchinson has long been a supporter of federal anti-drug efforts, from his early career as the youngest U.S. attorney through his work on the House Speaker's Task Force for a Drug-Free America. Meanwhile, Johnson has broken ranks with the Republican party, calling for the decriminalization of marijuana, a transition from incarceration to drug treatment programs and an overhaul of the nation's drug sentencing laws.

Hutchinson has served as DEA administrator since August of this year. A practicing attorney for 21 years before being elected to Congress in 1995, he was appointed by President Ronald Reagan as U.S. attorney for western Arkansas at the age of 31. While serving his third term in Congress, he was tapped by President George W. Bush to join the administration and was confirmed with a bipartisan vote of 98-1 in the U.S. Senate.

While in Congress, Hutchinson led the fight against drugs by serving on the House Judiciary Committee and the Select Committee on Intelligence. As a member of the Speaker's Task Force for a Drug-Free America, he was charged with finding new approaches to reduce drug use among the nation's youth.

Johnson is the first governor of New Mexico to be elected to two four-year consecutive terms. He was elected to be the 26th governor of New Mexico in 1994 and was re-elected in 1998.

A number of drug policy reform bills proposed by Johnson in the New Mexico legislature have been passed in the 2001 regular session. These include bills which would lead to the early release of inmates convicted of nonviolent drug offenses, restore the vote for felons who have served their sentences, increase the availability of sterile syringes in pharmacies for drug users and limit liability for the administration of anti-opioids.

The Federalist Society for Law and Public Policy Studies is a group of conservatives and libertarians interested in the current state of the legal order. It is founded on the principles that the state exists to preserve freedom, that the separation of governmental powers is central to our Constitution and that it is the province and duty of the judiciary to say what the law is, not what it should be.

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