More and more politicians are revising their earlier stance on cannabis in favor of legalizing the drug. But some, like former NYC mayor Rudy Giuliani, are sticking to their views that marijuana has no place in polite society. For the former narcotics prosecutor and mayor, now turned Trump legal adviser, no amount of evidence, data, research, or personal testimony on the safety and benefits of medical or adult-use cannabis matters. Giuliana even stated in 2014 that “marijuana can deteriorate your brain.” Instead, 20 years since his crackdown on NYC, Giuliani remains anti-marijuana.
“Broken Windows” and Giuliani’s Anti-Marijuana Legacy
In the early 1990s, Rudy Giuliani made a name for himself as a tough-on-crime mayor who would crack down on what he called “quality-of-life offenses“. Teaming up with notorious police commissioner William Bratton, Giuliani built his anti-crime worldview on the criminological theory of “broken windows.”
First introduced by social scientists in 1982, broken windows theory asserts that visible signs of crime should take priority. But the visible also meant the minor. The idea was that by targeting minor crimes, one could make an atmosphere of order and lawfulness. In turn, that would prevent more serious crimes from taking place.
Under Giuliani’s and Bratton’s plan, things like public urination, public alcohol consumption, and possessing small amounts of marijuana became easier to punish. They also started carrying tougher consequences.
And if the goal was locking mass numbers of people up for non-violent, minor marijuana offenses, the plan certainly worked. In fact, it created a legacy of racially disparate mass incarceration NYC is still reeling from today.
Historically, marijuana possession arrests were around 1,000 per year before Giuliani took office. Under his watch, the rate ballooned to more than 40,000 annually.