More than 20 African American leaders in California are calling for the resignation of Alice Huffman, president of the California State Conference for the NAACP. Huffman drew the ire of some leaders when she publicly backed the effort to legalize marijuana in the state.

Bishop Ron Allen was among the members of the International Faith-Based Coalition who stated that Proposition 19 on the November ballot would be harmful to African Americans. "Why would the state NAACP advocate for blacks to stay high?" Allen said. "It's going to cause crime to go up. There will be more drug babies."

Huffman has stood firm, stating that she is not going to resign. She also cited a number of African American leaders across the country who support her position.

"Prop. 19 is about eliminating enforcement practices that are targeting and creating a permanent underclass of citizens of African Americans caught in a criminal justice system, while other people, a more privileged class, go free,'' Huffman said.

According to a study by the Drug Policy Alliance, a group that supports the legalization of marijuana, African Americans make up less than 7 percent of California's population, but represent 22 percent of the arrests for marijuana possession.



Allen has suggested that Huffman's position is driven by money. The Open Society Institute, a group that has helped to finance marijuana legalization campaigns, has given $700,000 to the national NAACP office.


Here's the deal on Alice Huffman, the NAACP and the legalization of marijuana:

1) Huffman is absolutely correct in her position. The War on Drugs has become a war on black America, leading to a serious mass incarceration problem that has threatened to undermine the black family across America. While some drugs, such as crack cocaine, are proven to be harmful, the verdict is still out on marijuana. At the very least, sending people to prison over the possession of marijuana makes me wonder if police don't have more important work to do. I've never smoked marijuana myself, but I've never been afraid of what a "weed head" might do to me in the middle of the night. Now, a crackhead, well, that's another issue.

2) Perhaps our losing battle in the fight against drugs might lead us to turn this into a public health issue rather than a criminal justice problem. It might make sense to tax the growth and sales of marijuana to help struggling economies like the one in California. Also, sending addicts for treatment and helping them might be more productive than sending them to jail.

3) Allen is probably right that the money plays a role in the NAACP's decision. The organization is known to be highly responsive to groups that give money, and it's not inconceivable that the money given to the national organization played a role in convincing Huffman to jump in the middle of unnecessary controversy. It is quite possible that Huffman just decided that now is the time for the relatively conservative NAACP to start backing the legalization of marijuana, but I doubt that her decision was made in a vacuum without some input from the national office. I suspect that if an anti-marijuana group had given twice as much to the NAACP as The Open Society Institute, you might not have heard a peep out of Huffman or anyone else for that matter.

4) The battle that Huffman faces is a constant reminder of the internal struggles that black America has when it comes to embracing the ideologies of the liberals who've supported our quest for civil rights. Let's be clear: The black community is a church-going group of relatively conservative people. They don't collectively support gay rights, abortion, the separation of church and state, or many of the other issues that liberals hold dear. Many African Americans are stuck with being liberal because liberals are the group that doesn't hate us as much as the conservatives do. If Republicans could find a bit more compassion for the poor and respect for issues like Affirmative Action, they'd get a whole lot more black voters.




Dr. Boyce Watkins is the founder of the Your Black World Coalition and a Scholarship in Action resident of the Institute for Black Public Policy. To have Dr. Boyce's commentary delivered to your e-mail, please click here.