The Day the Marshals Came to Town

The Drug-Free Marshal badge signifies the status as role models for other children

That commission began on Saturday, April 3, 1993, in the Garden Pavilion at the Church of Scientology Celebrity Centre in Hollywood.

There, more than 200 pre-teens were welcomed by actor John Travolta, actress Anne Archer, FBI Special Agent Brent Braun and Los Angeles County Marshal Captain Steve Day and others. A sheaf of congratulations and good wishes came to these founding Marshals, as well — from City Hall, the halls of Congress, the Nancy Reagan Foundation, just to name a few.

At that opening event, each youth signed their name to the newly drafted pledge to live a drug-free life, after which Messrs. Travolta and Day swore them in as the world’s first Drug-Free Marshals.

“I am very proud of you for taking this oath, and you should be very proud of it, too,” wrote former First Lady Nancy Reagan in her message to these founding Marshals. “Everyone is counting on you to help other people say NO, and I have always said that there is no better way to stop this menace than for drug-free youths to serve as role models to friends, peers and family members. We are counting on you, and I know you can do it!”

The word — as well as their efforts — quickly spread. With the Clinton administration in need of young guns to provide peer pressure in the “war on drugs,” the Drug-Free Marshals’ focus on both drug education and prevention met with instant agreement. Within weeks of the inaugural LA event, more than 100 youth in the Nation’s Capital were sworn in — this time by the then-U.S. Drug Czar Lee Brown and members of the U.S. Marshals Service.

By year’s end Brown was joined by US Attorney General Janet Reno and Partnership for a Drug-Free America Chairman James E. Burke in welcoming the Marshals to participate in the National Forum on Substance Abuse. Jim Copple, national director for the sponsoring Community Anti-Drug Coalitions of America presented this perspective to the import — and impact — of the Drug-Free Marshals’ mission: “The substance abuse coalitions were formed as Americans across the nation began to mobilize at the grassroots level to reclaim their communities from drugs. Drug-Free Marshals is an example of the impact these groups can have on a local drug problem.”