We continue our newest offer for donating members, the reprinted drug policy classic The Marijuana Conviction: A History of Marijuana Prohibition in the United States. Originally published in 1974, this amazing work by professors Richard Bonnie and Charles Whitebread was the first comprehensive history of marijuana use and its prohibition in the United States. Bonnie and Whitebread's historical overview examines the origins and history of marijuana prohibition as well as the laws' unintended consequences.

Thanks to a generous donation from our friends at the Drug Policy Alliance, we are able to offer this 368-page volume, which retails at $32.49, for $22 including shipping. (Add $2 for Canada or Mexico or $8 for overseas.) Donate $22 or more to StoptheDrugWar.org and you will be eligible to receive a complimentary of The Marijuana Conviction. Click here to make a donation online by credit card or PayPal. You can also donate by mail -- info below.

As a reader of Drug War Chronicle you know that it is a challenging time in drug policy reform. Medical marijuana is under attack; draconian sentencing bills are getting heard in Congress; drug testing bills are spreading from state to state. To help us fight back as hard and as well as we can, I hope you'll consider donating more than $22 if you can afford it, or to supplement your $22 with a continuing monthly donation. If gift items like The Marijuana Conviction are not important to you, I hope you'll consider sending a donation that's entirely for our work. (We are grateful for donations of any size -- don't feel bad if $22 is what you have to spare and you want the book!)

Donations to StoptheDrugWar.org can be made online at http://stopthedrugwar.org/donate, or they can be mailed to: DRCNet Foundation (tax-deductible), P.O. Box 18402, Washington, DC 20036; or Drug Reform Coordination Network (non-deductible for lobbying), same address. (Contact us for information if you wish to make a donation of stock.) Be sure to indicate if you are requesting The Marijuana Conviction or another of our current gift items.

Thank you for standing with us to stop the drug war's cruelties and meet the opportunity this time offers to make a brighter future. And don't get discouraged by the challenges our movement and the cause are currently facing: Time, and the truth, are on our side!

Sincerely,

David Borden, Executive Director
StoptheDrugWar.org
Washington, DC
http://stopthedrugwar.org

	Donate $50 or more and you can receive a complimentary copy of Prohibition on DVD or Blu-ray! Click here to read our review of Prohibition!

Dear Drug War Chronicle reader:

If you have been following my bulletins the last two months, and if you've been reading our in-depth online newsletter Drug War Chronicle, then you know about the setbacks that drug policy has faced recently in the way of a harder environment in Congress and an aggressive federal campaign against medical marijuana. But you also know about the increasing public support for marijuana legalization -- polls breaking 50% support for it for first time. You know that arrest and incarceration levels for drug offenses have finally leveled off, even slightly decreased. And you know that the discussion of drug policy reform and the need to end prohibition itself has been taken up by more and more respected global figures and media. As I've written lately, time is on our side.

As we approach December 31st, would you make a 2011 tax-deductible deduction donation to support our educational nonprofit, DRCNet Foundation for the coming year? If you're not doing tax-deductible donating at this time, would you instead make a non-deductible donation to our lobbying nonprofit, Drug Reform Coordination Network? Please consider making generous donations to one or both of these entities at this important time.

As I've reported in recent emails, dozens of StoptheDrugWar.org supporters have contributed to our organization in recent months to help us secure and prepare our programs for the new year. Copies of the email messages they responded to are online: our appeal for support for our blog and our online legislative center; information on what the legislative center does for our efforts; some ways that readers make important use of the Drug War Chronicle. One thing I haven't followed up before on, but will now, is what a difference these donations made in letting us invest again in our blog. We've had some big links since Scott Morgan resumed writing for us in mid-October, and more than 400,000 unique visitors have come to the Speakeasy blog during that time! Member support has made a difference in our program to get the word out about prohibition and the drug war.

To thank our donating members, we are pleased to offer complimentary copies of the recent Prohibition documentary made by Ken Burns and Lynn Novick for PBS. These three disk sets include 90 minutes of bonus footage not available on the web site or shown on TV. Donate $50 or more to StoptheDrugWar.org and you will be eligible to receive a copy from us on DVD or Blu-ray. Click here to make a donation online by credit card or PayPal. You can also donate by mail -- info below.

(If you've donated recently and are disappointed you didn't get to ask for a copy of Prohibition with your donation, please let us know -- we'll be glad to send you a copy if you've donated $50 or more in the last few months, or to combine a smaller donation you've made with a new donation for the difference to qualify you for the offer.)

Please note that even with a nonprofit, bulk discount, we are spending nearly $25 per copy to purchase these and send them to you -- if you can afford to donate more than $50, or to supplement your $50 donation with a small, continuing monthly donation, I hope you'll consider doing so. If gift items are not important to you, I hope you'll consider sending a donation that's entirely for our work.

Thank you for standing with us to stop the drug war's cruelties and meet the opportunity this time offers to make a brighter future. And don't get discouraged by the challenges our movement and the cause are currently facing: Time, and the truth, are on our side!

Sincerely,

 

David Borden, Executive Director
StoptheDrugWar.org
Washington, DC
http://stopthedrugwar.org

P.S. You can read Phil Smith's film review of Prohibition in Drug War Chronicle here.

Dear Drug War Chronicle reader:

Next week we will be announcing on our email list a new premium for donating members, "Prohibition," the recent documentary by Ken Burns and Lynn Novick made for PBS. Read Phil Smith's film review of "Prohibition" in Drug War Chronicle here.

Copies of "Prohibition," on DVD or Blu-ray, will be available through StoptheDrugWar.org at no additional charge to members donating $50 or more. To make a donation to StoptheDrugWar.org, visit our online donation form -- if you do so before next week when we update the donation form, you can request a copy of "Prohibition" by writing us a note in the comment box. Also, if you have donated recently and think you would have liked to receive "Prohibition" with your donation, please let us know -- we'll be glad to send you a copy if you've donated $50 or more in the last few months, or to combine a smaller donation you've made with a new donation for the difference to qualify you for the offer.

Please note that even with the nonprofit, bulk discount, we are spending nearly $25 per copy to purchase these and send them to you -- if you can afford to donate more than $50, or to supplement your $50 donation with a small, continuing monthly donation, I hope you'll consider doing so. If gift items are not important to you, I hope you'll consider sending a donation that's entirely for our work.

Dozens of StoptheDrugWar.org supporters who have contributed to our organization in recent months to help us secure and prepare our programs for the new year. Copies of the email messages they responded to are online: click here to read our appeal for support for our blog and our online legislative center; click here for more information on what the legislative center does for our efforts, and click here for some reasons to support the Drug War Chronicle newsletter.

Donations to our organization can be made online at http://stopthedrugwar.org/donate, or they can be mailed to: DRCNet Foundation (tax-deductible), P.O. Box 18402, Washington, DC 20036; or Drug Reform Coordination Network (non-deductible for lobbying), same address. (Contact us for information if you wish to make a donation of stock.)

Thank you for standing with us to stop the drug war's cruelties and meet the opportunity this time offers to make a brighter future. And don't get discouraged by the challenges our movement and the cause are currently facing: Time, and the truth, are on our side!

Sincerely,



David Borden, Executive Director
StoptheDrugWar.org
Washington, DC
http://stopthedrugwar.org

Dear Drug Policy Reformer:

During the last three weeks, more than 80 supporters helped us meet a deadline by donating to let us keep our legislative system and top-quality email list service. Thank you!

Today we seek your help for a different, especially important part of our web site, the Drug War Chronicle newsletter. The Chronicle reaches over a million people per year, before any reprinting on other web sites or redistribution to other email lists, and it serves the broadest set of purposes for the most of them. If you're not currently subscribed to the Chronicle, you can check it out and read the latest articles from it here.

It's not a secret that the troubled economy has been very hard on nonprofits. Many good organizations have downsized dramatically, and some have even shut down. StoptheDrugWar.org is fortunate to still be here. But we need your help, more perhaps than ever, to keep the most important StoptheDrugWar.org service, Drug War Chronicle, at full strength.

Actually, we want to do more than continue the Chronicle at its current level. We have an amazing expansion plan that includes reaching out to policymakers (nationally and internationally), a major social media effort, continuing the Legislative Center that you've heard of, more. But to credibly approach major funders for those programs, we need to be able to show them that our members are supporting us and that we have a full year's funding lined up for the newsletter itself.

If you haven't donated recently, would you make a donation today for this or other StoptheDrugWar.org programs?

Drug War Chronicle plays a crucial and unique role for individuals and organizations leading the charge with us for reform -- read what a few of them had to say recently about how:

Andrew Livingston, founder of Colgate University Students for Sensible Drug Policy:

Before I started Colgate University's chapter of Students for Sensible Drug Policy, I would stay up to date on issues in drug policy by reading stories in the Drug War Chronicle. The information I gained familiarized me with the growing movement for drug policy reform and stoked my passion to actively change our nation's unjust policies. Today I use StoptheDrugWar.org to keep myself informed and to teach other students in my SSDP chapter about the most up to date drug policy issues both within the United States and abroad.

Even though I am just a student I have already donated to StoptheDrugWar.org. Their work is indispensable to our cause, and I know it will continue to generate passionate young students like myself who want nothing more than to end our failed drug war policies.
 

Dale Gieringer, head of California NORML, recipient of the 2011 Robert C. Randall Award for Achievement in the Field of Citizen Action:

Drug War Chronicle is the single best source for drug war journalism. I can't praise Drug War Chronicle enough. Phil Smith deserves special kudos for his journalism. I regularly re-post your articles to our California lists. Please keep up the good work.
 

Adam Hurter, Massachusetts activist:

I've been drumming up a lot of support for medical marijuana and legalization here in Massachusetts, and StoptheDrugWar.org is my primary source for information that I use in talking to people about current drug policy reform issues. Without it I wouldn't be in the know myself. It's known in my circles as the primary source of drug policy news. In fact, people are pretty dependent on it at this point.

 

There is an incredible amount at stake in the fight to change drug policy right now -- this may truly be the most important moment in the issue we've seen in the entire history of the organization. States and the Congress are considering sentencing reform, and public support for marijuana legalization is finally reaching the 50% mark. Yet the government is conducting its most aggressive crackdown against medical marijuana -- just medical marijuana -- and regressive committee chairmen refuse to give important reform bills the fair hearings and consideration they are due.

We can't let them get away with that. And that's why we need your help to decide whether StoptheDrugWar.org and Drug War Chronicle can enter this historical moment at full strength and looking to grow. Will you step up today in meeting the needs of the times? Please make a generous donation to StoptheDrugWar.org -- non-deductible for our lobbying work, or tax-deductible for our educational work like Drug War Chronicle -- to help us enter the new year right.

Donations to our organization can be made online at http://stopthedrugwar.org/donate, or they can be mailed to: DRCNet Foundation (tax-deductible), P.O. Box 18402, Washington, DC 20036; or Drug Reform Coordination Network (non-deductible for lobbying), same address. (Contact us for information if you wish to make a donation of stock.)

Thank you for standing with us to stop the drug war's cruelties and meet the opportunity this time offers to make a brighter future. And don't get discouraged by the challenges our movement and the cause are currently facing: Time, and the truth, are on our side!

Sincerely,

David Borden, Executive Director
StoptheDrugWar.org
Washington, DC
http://stopthedrugwar.org

P.S. Reply to this email or use our contact form to send us your Drug War Chronicle testimonial!