Pubdate: Mon, 08 May 2006
Source: Montreal Gazette (CN QU)
Copyright: 2006 The Gazette, a division of Southam Inc.
Contact:  http://www.canada.com/montreal/montrealgazette/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/274
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/decrim.htm (Decrim/Legalization)

RETHINKING DRUG LAWS IS RIGHT PATH

Mexico's eye-opening new approach to drug-abuse law comes just as 
Canada is stepping back from decriminalizing marijuana.

In both countries, it must be admitted that the old approach - 
treating as a criminal every person caught with even a small amount 
of a banned substance - has not produced hoped-for results. The 
market for illegal drugs has not declined.

Instead, criminal penalties have filled the jails and created an 
enormously profitable business run by people quite willing to use 
violence to ensure market share.

In Mexico, furthermore, the war on drugs has produced an appreciable 
number of corrupt police officers, prosecutors and politicians.

This lose-lose situation has strong parallels to Prohibition, the ban 
on liquor in the U.S. between 1920 and 1933. Prohibition was enacted 
to solve the same problems associated with illegal drugs today. It did not.

Among the unintended consequences were increased consumption of 
alcohol, increased crime, which also became organized, and decreased 
tax revenue.

The loss of tax money was coupled with a steep spike in government 
spending as the state battled the demon rum.

There is also U.S. research suggesting that Prohibition was also 
responsible for many drinkers, cut off from their drug of choice, 
switching from alcohol over to marijuana, cocaine, even heroin or opium.

Despite the evidence of its experiment with Prohibition, the United 
States remains wedded to its war on drugs and is unhappy that its 
neighbours to the north and south are even thinking of taking a new tack.

In this country, the Harper government has said it will abandon the 
late Liberal government's intention to decriminalize small amounts of 
marijuana.

The Mexican government, however, caught between violent drug cartels 
to its south in Colombia and the world's biggest market for illegal 
drugs, the United States, on its northern border, has proposed a law 
to decriminalize possession of small amounts of cocaine, heroin, 
marijuana, LSD and amphetamines.

Some U.S. officials, such as the mayor of San Diego, have protested 
that the Mexican legislation will result in a larger supply of drugs 
in the United States.

Mexican President Vicente Fox is not insensitive to U.S. fears. In 
fact, he sent the proposed bill back to the Mexican Congress, urging 
it to state clearly in the bill that possessing and consuming illegal 
drugs will remain a criminal offence.

The United States should take a long look at itself.

More than half of all U.S. prisoners are behind bars for drug-related 
offenses. Neither Canada nor Mexico wants to follow in those footsteps.
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MAP posted-by: Beth Wehrman